


You Forget We Were In Love

by CaptainSlow



Category: Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-21
Updated: 2019-05-29
Packaged: 2020-03-08 17:15:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 51,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18899107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainSlow/pseuds/CaptainSlow
Summary: In the very Beginning of it all, there were an angel and... an angel.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm afraid I took some liberties with the interpretation of the events in the book. There are also some canon divergences and most certainly lots of religious inaccuracies. Beg pardon. But this' a free land of fanfiction after all, isn't it? 
> 
> Just like other stories, this thing simply happened to me, and I felt the need to get it out of my head and off my chest, so here it is, hopefully coherent enough.
> 
> The story was inspired by Queen's "Let me in your heart again" song, hence the title.  
> The initial quote is from another song of that legendary band, "Who wants to live forever".

_Who wants to live forever?_

_Who dares to love forever,_

_Oh, when love must die? ©_

***

**Prologue**

*

If you asked the demon and the angel when their acquaintance began, the former would tell you that, of course, their relationship dates back to the Garden, to that first incident of him encountering the lonesome angel who was guarding the Eastern Gate just as he was about to slither into Eden and cause the trouble which would later be dubbed The Original Sin (humanity has always been quite inventive when it comes to names, or so it seems).

The angel in question, however, would smile sadly and say that the Garden hadn't even been created when it all began; it is just that, unfortunately, he is the only one of the two of them who is, for some unfathomable reason, allowed to keep those memories of Before. But no one ever asks, so the knowledge remains his burden to carry and his pain to bear.

*

The two of them share six thousand years of mutual eventful history and by the moment the long-prophesised Apocalypse is literally on their doorstep, Aziraphale has almost managed to reconcile with Crowley as he is – a demon, not an angel anymore, not an angel for six millennia, one viciously refusing to accept the mere notion of love, rejecting Aziraphale's love and deprived of any memory of Heaven whatsoever. Over the six thousand years they've been acquainted with each other as representatives of the opposing sides here on Earth, Aziraphale has more than once contemplated telling the demon what he knows and what Crowley doesn't remember, but every single time he decided against it. The problem is, there's really no point in disclosing the truth unless he wants to bring in confusion and awkwardness into their otherwise very satisfying relationship. He's come to believe that Crowley must be incapable of love, of both experiencing and perceiving it. He's long reconciled with the fact that the demon must have forgotten it all the moment he Fell, all the memories of the time he had been an angel wiped out of his mind as if they had never existed there in the first place. There's also no sense in hoping that they will come back one day – it hasn't happened in the six millennia, and it's unlikely to even if the angel was prepared to wait for another six thousand years. Why remind the demon of something he's certain doesn't exist? And even if Aziraphale managed to persuade him, even if Crowley believed him that they'd known each other Before, it wouldn't turn him into an angel he once used to be and it wouldn't make him love Aziraphale again, not the way he used to love him back in Heaven, not any other way.   
  
Besides, the angel knows he should be immensely grateful for what he already has. None of his brothers or sisters back in Heaven have any memories of the ones they lost, and surely none of their lost soulmates, even if in demonic form, are right beside them. Aziraphale, though, managed to retain both. Crowley has no love for him, he's certain, not the kind of love Aziraphale yearns for, but Crowley is there, has been there for six thousand years, and he's not just a mere counterpart in their earthly business. The angel never got that love back, but he was given something else instead, wasn't he? He was given the being he loved, one he came to love all over again, one he came to know even better than when the said being was with him in Heaven, one whose company and friendship he appreciates and treasures. He's certain he can trust Crowley as he trusts himself, he knows Crowley trusts him just the same. Isn't that already a lot? It is, of course, and Aziraphale is not going to delude himself into believing that confessing his feelings to Crowley could change anything for the better. He knows he should not wish for the unimaginable. He does wish for it, all the same, but it doesn't mean he is going to let this unimaginable destroy what improbable relationship they have managed to create in spite of it all, all those sides and their respective bosses and their great cosmic games be damned.

It is hard at times, unbearable at others, but, for most part, Aziraphale has managed to reconcile with it. He loves the demon and, because of that, he is prepared to make sure Crowley feels comfortable enough to stay with him, even if it means throttling all those feelings he's had since the very dawn of times, literally so.

So on it goes like this, decade after decade, century after century, millennia after millennia, until the unimaginable finally happens.

***

 


	2. Chapter 2

***

In the very Beginning, there are an angel… and an angel.   
  
It is the time before Time as everyone knows it has been created. It is the time before Earth has been created, and the time when humans only exist as a draft on His desk. It is the time before doubts began, ones which gave rise to questioning; the time before betrayal which ended up in bitter parting.

As of yet, though, there are no such things as Sides, either Above or Below; there's only Heaven, for everyone, and the place is full of Joy. Love is in the very nature of things. It's everywhere, permeating the space, so tangible it seems possible to touch. For now, there's peace and delight and hope and excitement and anticipation. For now, they're all sisters and brothers and, above all, soulmates, beloved and loving.

The name of one of those two angels is Aziraphale. His job – every angel has one, Heaven is no place for sloth, after all – is to keep track of everything which has been happening so far. He is bright and fair, with a shock of unruly blond curls adorning his head, with piercing eyes the shade of crystal-blue of the sky on the very first warm day of spring, as he will be told once, millennia later in an entirely different place by a being of an entirely different persuasion. He is of middle height, ephemerally slender but at the same time perfectly capable of wielding a sword – even though no one knows why any angel might need such a skill, not yet anyway. He is a skilful healer and an exceptionally talented story-teller; he loves long walks among heavenly groves of tangerine and apple trees and in its plentiful gardens, has a special fondness for reading and a particular liking for sweet nectar. He can't dance but he sings fairly well. And he's got a best friend – a soulmate, even though the word itself won't be invented for a while. It's not uncommon among angels – most of them happen to have been created pair creatures, seeking bonds and companionship.

Aziraphale's best friend is, in turn, the complete opposite of Aziraphale himself. His name does not matter here as it will be forgotten soon enough, wiped out of existence forever except, perhaps, for the mind of the Creator himself. This other angel is tall and lithe, his dark, almost black, hair a silken cascade of loose ringlets falling down to his shoulders. The features of his face are angelically regular and beautiful, but there's certain uncanny sharpness about them which is only softened when he smiles. He smiles a lot, though, especially when he's with Aziraphale. But the most striking thing about him is his eyes of exceptional, rich amber. Cerulean blue and emerald green are common among angels, but Aziraphale has yet to encounter someone with eyes of that extraordinary golden quality. This angel adores all things green and blooming – he's not God's own gardener for nothing, after all – and he loves flying fast and tumbling down from high places, enjoying the feeling of wind playing in his hair and feathers. He's also mesmerizingly good at dancing, which is rather uncommon among the divine folk. His mind is exceptionally curious, so he loves to ask all possible sorts of questions, especially those which Aziraphale, or any other angel for that matter, has no answers to.  
  
And he loves Aziraphale. Sometimes, when there are only the two of them, he simply calls him ' _angel'_ , and, uttered by his lips, the word acquires some unique, distinctly tender, meaning.

They've got plenty of time for each other as time itself is still a work in progress, so Aziraphale teaches him to sing, and he, in turn, teaches Aziraphale to dance. They fly among golden clouds and walk in meadows full of fragrant grasses; they talk and they laugh and they make predictions on what is yet to come; they love and they rejoice as no such thing as despair or separation or grief has been created, not yet; for the time being they still have the time to drink each other's beauty and bathe in each other's affection.

*

When the disaster strikes, Aziraphale knows it –  _feels_  it on some intrinsic level – even before the news reaches him. All of a sudden, there is a sucking void in his soul the departure of the other has left in the place he used to occupy, a place of the existence of which Aziraphale wasn't even quite aware. He always thought his soul was his, whole and complete, belonging strictly to him, yet now it turns out he was mistaken, and some part of it – oh Lord,  _such_  a huge part of it – has been taken by that other one, that other one whose name he for some reason cannot even remember no matter how hard he tries.   
  
Terrified, Aziraphale runs towards the main Heavenly square, where meetings are normally held and where the Metatron announces His will, and on his way he encounters other angels – oh so many of them – in a state resembling his, scared and confused, feeling that something, some catastrophe of tremendous proportions, has just happened but not knowing what exactly it was. Desperate to prove his premonition wrong, he asks those he bumps into about his soulmate, but, to his growing horror, he cannot even remember the name of the one he's looking for. It slips through his mind like grains of fine sand through fingers, real but elusive, the name of that other angel who he loves and can still imagine in every vivid detail, the one he saw just a while ago, the one with golden eyes and dark curls and fluid dancing grace. Just like him, there are those who're looking for their own loved ones, and just like him, all they can come up with is the description of their appearance but not their true names. By the time Aziraphale reaches the plaza, he's so afraid and heart-broken he is on the verge of weeping. 

And then the news is finally broken to them, scared souls clustered at Heaven's main meeting ground, news that their beloved brothers and sisters have Fallen. It provokes a murmur of incomprehension among those present for no one has ever heard of what it means to Fall, not yet, but the connotation it has is difficult to miss. On the plaza, the angels flock together as if unconsciously searching for companionship and support as Father himself recounts the events.   
  
Lucifer was the first to Fall – it provokes another tide of awed whispering from the crowd,  _Lucifer, the Morningstar_ , they murmur in shock – and lots of other angels followed him, for they have questioned, and then have doubted, and they have rebelled. Now, it seems, there's Good and Evil, there are Sides, Above and Below, and those who have chosen a way different from that of Father's are now dubbed demons.  
  
Aziraphale listens to it along with the rest, surrounded by his fellow angels, all of them just as astounded and miserable as he is, but his mind keeps drifting, drifting back to  _him_ , refusing to acknowledge the bitter truth. There must have been some mistake, he thinks desperately, some unlucky chain of events, some tragic accident which has led to this. Deep down inside, however, Aziraphale knows, knows despite  _not_   _wanting_  to know it, that that other one – and it is a horrible thing, to know someone and not be able to name them – was always different, different from him and different from the rest. Way too curious, constantly asking questions which couldn't be answered by anyone in Heaven except perhaps the Father himself; way too thrill-seeking, indulging in flying high and tumbling low; way too smart, able to make the most accurate predictions about what was to come. Distractedly, Aziraphale wonders whether he knew this would happen, whether he knew about his own Fall and never said a word.

Thus, grief has been created, and now Heaven is full of it, grief and sorrow for the Fallen ones, for all of them and every single one in particular, and Aziraphale grieves with the rest, and he grieves for the love lost, and he grieves for what is destined to come.

There are many like him in Heaven, those who have lost their soulmates – and this is the time when this term finally pops into existence, because now it is obvious that their own souls will never be complete again. There are many like him and they share the pain of the loss with each other, which helps to a certain extent but is not capable of remedying the damage that has been done.

Much later, Aziraphale will think that it's not only Lucifer's followers who ended up being the flawed ones. Somehow, even those who remained loyal to Father and stayed in Heaven have never become the same they used to be before the Fall of their brothers and sisters. Much later, apart from only  _thinking_ so, Aziraphale will actually voice it to his only companion stuck on Earth just like him, and the latter will hiss at him, angrily, and then tell him to shut the something up before the guys Up There have got the wind of someone questioning the blasted Ineffable Plan and rejoiced at an opportunity of making yet another angel Fall.

*

The first time Aziraphale encounters Crawly – for back then, he's still  _Crawly,_  the snake demon – is at the Garden gate and the angel is blissfully unaware of who this snake demon really is, or rather who it used to be. He'll learn it in good time, but right now it is indeed a blessing – or a lucky coincidence, or just a part of the Ineffable plan – that he doesn't know the truth. History might be written differently if he did.

He is stationed here at the Eastern Gate to guard the place and ward away trouble in case some wile agent of the Adversary decides to invade it thus jeopardising Father's Big Plan. At first, when he was given the orders, it did sound rather reasonable, but with plenty of free time on his hands and with pretty much nothing to occupy himself with as there are no hellish invasions on the agenda, Aziraphale starts to wonder. After all, why go to so much trouble and create the Garden here on Earth where its inhabitants may be exposed and vulnerable to the cunning tricks of the Adversary when Heaven would be way safer for God's little experiment? But that's not his place to decide, of course, and not his position to know the answers, either. Besides, these days his mind is very far from any ineffable plans anyway. What dwells on it almost constantly is how acutely empty the part of his soul which that other one occupied is.   
  
The loneliness is intensified by the fact that he seems to be the only angel in Heaven who still can remember in every little detail the one he lost to the Adversary. All the other ones he has spoken to are aware of the entire disaster but somehow appear to be deprived of the exact recollections of the angels who have Fallen. They grieve, but it's as if they're grieving  _in general_ , not quite being able to remember the ones they grieve for.   
  
Aziraphale doesn't know if he has been  _allowed_ to keep his memories or whether it is but a malfunction in the system, nor does he care much which one it is. Back in Heaven, he wished he could to talk to someone hoping it would provide at least some sort of relief, but he was afraid – terrified, really – that if he let it become known that he still was in the possession of those memories, they would be taken away from him, too, and he couldn't let that happen. Memories of  _him_ are not  _him_ , of course, and they are excruciating in their vividness, but they're the only reminder of that other angel Aziraphale has left, so he treasures every single one of them, agonising as they are. In the end, he never says a word to anyone, keeping his memories and his pain to himself.

When Aziraphale finally meets the Serpent, he is not what you would call his normal self. He's being decidedly  _un_ -angelic, brooding and miserable, lovelorn and lonely, questioning and trying the best he can to stop doing it. Sometimes he is on the verge of wishing he could question it all  _properly_ so that it would be enough to make him Fall, too. In that case, they could meet again, but Aziraphale shies away from such thoughts as soon as he's aware of their presence in his mind. What good could it possibly do? There's no love in Hell, or so they've been told, and even if they find each other,  _he_ won't be the same Down There. Aziraphale himself most certainly wouldn't be himself Down There, either. His best alternative is bear with it and be grateful that he is still able to remember it all, every single detail of what was Before, unlike his brothers and sisters from Heaven. Perhaps it's a poor consolation as all those vivid recollections are more poignant rather than soothing, but since he's got no choice in the matter, it has to be a consolation.  
  
The beauty of Earth helps, the fragrance of the blooming flowers and grasses wafting from behind the gate eases Aziraphale's heartache, but it also has an adverse effect. The one he lost was always fond of lush greenery and beautiful blossoms and flowers. Heused to tend to the Heavenly hardens, doing it with love and joy, and the sheer magnificence and grandeur of the nature around also evoke nostalgia so severe the angel cannot hold back the flow of mournful tears. He wishes that other onecould behold the Garden in all its glory, too. He wishes they could do it together, and so Aziraphale weeps, all alone on this beautiful green planet.

Crawly the Serpent sneaks into his life for the very first time during one of his crying fits as the angel sits with his face buried in the palms of his hands, his back against one of the gate posts. He doesn't notice that he's being watched until a soft hiss comes from a small patch of grass nearby, a hiss which sounds a bit embarrassed, annoyed and curious at the same time. Aziraphale gives a start, sniffles, and wipes his leaking eyes with the heels of his palms, blinking owlishly as he tries to identify the source of the sound.

Just a few metres away from him, in the ankle-deep grass, there's a snake looking straight at him with an expression of its slit golden eyes oddly intelligent and curious for an animal. Its scales are midnight-black and glittering mildly in the soft rays of the setting sun. Its split tongue darts out again and again, tasting the surroundings. Judging by the look of the serpent, Aziraphale estimates it must be quite a large one and wonders what such a specimen is doing here. He's never encountered a snake as big as this, neither inside the Garden, nor in its vicinity.

"Whassssup, angel?" it asks, in a strange mixture of speech and hissing, and Aziraphale blinks at it yet again, taken aback.

"Are you really doing it?" he sniffs, for the time being having completely forgotten about his sorrow.

"Doing  _what_?"

Aziraphale has no idea if snakes can actually get startled, but this one certainly makes an impression that it can. It slithers forward, tentatively, as if apprehensive Aziraphale might swat it or something. Given its size, though, its worries are groundless. If he had a desire to do anything like that, he'd have to accomplish it using his flaming sword.

"Speaking," the angel elaborates and sniffs again.

"Why, iss there a law againssst it?" the serpent hisses, and, unexpectedly, it looks as if it's grinning broadly, the expression giving it both cunning and somewhat disconcertingly endearing look, which resonates with something deep inside Aziraphale. It's such a vague emotion – barely an emotion at all, more like some whimsical impression – that the angel gives it a miss, attributing it to the fact that he's never before encountered a talking serpent.

"No, of course, not," he says hastily. Grief or no grief, he has no intention of being rude even to the representatives of the local fauna. "It's just that… well, it's nice to have someone to be able to talk to. It gets quite lonely here sometimes."

The snake cocks its black head to one side, as if studying Aziraphale, its golden eyes two shining embers in the rays of the mild evening sun, then nods and cautiously slithers forward, closer.

*

This is Crowley's idea of how it all started, at the Eastern Gate of Eden, when he silver-tongued the strangely miserable angel into trusting him and then deceitfully made him disclose quite a few pieces of vital information. He thinks Aziraphale was crying because of the sheer boredom of having to carry out his duty and guard the Gate basically against nothing at all while missing his home in Heaven terribly. He thinks so because this is what Aziraphale told him – it sounded pretty reasonable, too – and he'll keep believing this version of the story for many a millennium. He's got absolutely no reason not to, after all, it seems perfectly credible. 

*

Over the course of the several weeks that follow, the serpent Crawly and the angel Aziraphale meet on a daily basis. Even when the latter learns that Crawly is a Hellish creature, he, even though becoming slightly more cautious, doesn't really mind his company. The main reason for it is that Aziraphale naively believes that the serpent has nothing to do with any of the Fallen, that he's nothing but a mere low-rank servant in the realm of the Down Below. This is exactly what Crawly tells him about himself, and Aziraphale simply takes his word on it.   
  
Crawly's endless chattering serves as a nice distraction from Aziraphale's sorrows, and even though most of it is mainly meaningless, the angel appreciates the company. Sometimes the serpent simply reiterates what he's seen or done during the day, sometimes he rants about just how tedious it is to be Hell's representative here on Earth where nothing at all is happening, sometimes he goes into lengthy rants about the point of it all, and once he says something about how Hell's bureaucracy gets the best of him, with lots of useless papers to fill in, and just how tiring it is when one is a mere snake and has no hands to actually hold a pen to do it, and then states dramatically that this is exactly why it is Hell; and despite himself, despite his grief, despite all the awful events which have taken place way too recently for the wounds to start healing, the angel laughs.

"At lassst," the serpent hisses, rearing up until his head is almost at the same level as Aziraphale's nose. "I was beginning to think your lot are completely deprived of the sssense of humour, but it seems at least you are not beyond redemption."

In the end, he makes the angel snicker and smile more than once over the course of their brief acquaintance; something which at first feels wrong and alien both on Aziraphale's face and to his ears, but after a while it starts to seem like a good thing, like the right thing to do. He's grateful to Crawly for it even when it turns out that he's the one who caused humanity's Fall from Grace, and this is the reason why the serpent survives that day despite all the trouble he created. Any other angel, especially one who's a part of the Heavenly host, which Aziraphale is, would have smitten the Hellish creature on the spot the first time he encountered him, not giving the fiend an opportunity to realise his evil plans.   
  
But Aziraphale is no ordinary angel and so Crawly lives to see another dawn and then many more afterwards. 

                               

***

 


	3. Chapter 3

***

Heaven, as Aziraphale remembers it, is ethereal and radiant, a place full of love which comes from everywhere. Earth is not like that, despite the fact that it's still young and fragrant, so versatile with its ever-changing weather and the sequence of nights and days, the vast variety of species of plants and animals, and with humans, so peculiar, so unspeakably different from each other and yet so amazingly the same. If the circumstances under which he arrived here had been different, Aziraphale would say that Earth is a remarkable place to be. By all means, it  _should_  be a remarkable place to be, but ever since he was stationed here as the agent of Heaven, it's been perceived by him more as a place of solitude and exile rather than home, and who could blame him? After all, he is all alone here on Earth. Other angels don't seem particularly enthusiastic about paying a visit, and there's no reason for Aziraphale to return to Heaven – there's no one to return to, and, anyway, he's got a job to perform here. As a matter of fact, he cannot quite say he misses Heaven, either. It's a different place now, a strange place, devoid of the presence of the one he has been living without ever since his Fall, and full of angels who have forgotten the ones they lost. Sometimes, he wonders why he hasn't been Felled for such thoughts. Sometimes, he wonders if anyone from Up There even remembers about his existence at all, except the times when he has to file in another report. Sometimes, he wonders if being the only one allowed to  _remember_ is his punishment for something he isn't even aware of having done.  
  
Aziraphale was informed that an agent of the Adversary was also sent to Earth at approximately the same time as him, and upon arriving here he received his instructions which obligated him to keep a close eye on his opposite number and thwart any wile plans the latter might try to carry out, smiting him if necessary. Yet Aziraphale has never had the chance to actually meet him in person – there hasn't been much work to do for either of them so far. Humanity's been taking its time, evolving slowly but surely.   
  
When the inevitable meeting does finally take place, though, it happens without any fair warning, and Aziraphale wouldn't have minded one. Admittedly, had he been told anything about what was going to happen, he might not have believed it anyway, but it still could have made his shock just a little less profound. Or maybe he's deceiving himself – nothing could've possibly softened it because the irony of it all is so bitter it seems like he's been turned into one big cosmic joke.  
  
They meet in that ancient land between two rivers, although at the time it's not yet anywhere near ancient. At the time, it's a thriving, fertile and bustling place.

The first time Aziraphale encounters the demon in question – although he doesn't know yet that he  _is_ a demon, he doesn't know anything at all about him, in fact – he is way too astounded to do anything but stare at him in abject terror, stare at how he is strutting leisurely through the market place, with a complacent smile plastered to his lips. 

What Aziraphale experiences first is, unsurprisingly, rejection. This simply cannot be happening, no chance in this old vast universe. He's either seeing things, perhaps drawn to the verge of insanity by his constant grief – even though he has no idea whatsoever whether angels can actually lose their mind or not – or it's nothing but some extremely unlikely, incredible coincidence. But even while he's thinking that, he already knows –  _feels_  on some intrinsic level of his being – that both assumptions are wrong.  
  
This person – this being – this  _someone_  – Aziraphale's looking at seems somehow different now, in an elusive way which the angel can't quite put his finger upon, not yet, but on the whole he's exactly the same, the same as Aziraphale remembers him from those long-gone days in Heaven, days which now seem to have happened in a dream rather than in reality. His looks haven't changed, not in any way Aziraphale can point out straightaway. It's the same dark hair that falls down to his shoulders in loose ringlets and the same odd grace he used to have back in Heaven, the same sharp cheekbones and the same pointy nose, his jawline prominently defined and the air of nonchalance still hanging all around him like second nature. He looks so much the same, in fact, that the first thought which comes to Aziraphale's mind all by its own accord, ridiculously, is that he never really Fell in the first place. There must have been some mistake and instead of Falling he ended up here on Earth. On the spur of the moment, the angel nearly bolts from where he stands a few stalls away and cries out—

Only this is what stops him – he doesn't remember his name, cannot for the life of him, and the words die down in his throat before they're voiced. And then this unbearably familiar stranger turns his head in Aziraphale's direction, still ignorant of the fact that he's being watched, and the angel can finally see his eyes. The sight makes him rooted to the ground right where he stands because those eyes… They  _are_  his and they  _aren't_  his at the same time, they're both terrifying and compelling, the slit yellow eyes of a serpent living in a human body, a  _serpent_ …

And then the realisation hits Aziraphale with the force of a tsunami, recognition and sudden, unwanted, understanding lighting up in his mind, and he feels both exultant and horrified, hopeful and desperate at the same time, his corporeal form nauseated from the sheer hurricane of most improbable kinds of emotions he has absolutely no time to comprehend and deal with properly.

That's  _him_ , all right, Aziraphale wouldn't mistake the being he loved –  _still_   _loves_  – for anyone else. And, yes, he's a Fallen one; of course, he is, angels don't have slit pupils of a snake looking out of their faces at the world around them; he hasn't changed much and at the same time everything about him feels different. And he's somewhat else, too, not only the being who was an angel once, an angel Aziraphale loved with every single bit of his angelic soul, and not only a Fallen one now, one of the many servants of Satan dwelling in Hell. He's also the one Aziraphale met back in the Garden, the one who caused the Fall of humanity, the creator of the original sin, the traitor slithering on his belly in the emerald grasses, the Serpent of Eden, and now it turns out he's also Aziraphale's opposite number here on Earth, his Adversary…

The angel's so taken aback that he doesn't have enough presence of mind to even wonder whether the serpent could still remember him when they met back in the Garden; whether he recognised him when he saw Aziraphale for the first time, at the Eastern Gate, weeping his eyes out; whether he betrayed him while  _knowing_  Aziraphale. He's way too stunned to wonder; for now all he can do is watch the demon--  
_  
\--but he's not a demon,_ Aziraphale's consciousness cries,  _he can't be a demon, this is a mistake, he would never make anything even vaguely resembling a demon, he was never like that--_  
  
\--wile in broad daylight, right before he open eyes, playing his tricks on innocent people around him and by the looks of him enjoying his pranks immensely. Here, somebody stumbles and sprawls on the ground, scraping their hands and knees; here, someone realises their purse's been stolen; here, the fresh bread in somebody's basket turns into a stale and mouldy loaf.

Hardly aware of what he's doing, Aziraphale follows him. He can't help it, as if being drawn to the other one by some invisible attractive force. To say that he's confused is to say nothing at all. His heart is hammering in his chest so hard that for the first time in his existence in the human corporation the angel actually becomes aware of its presence in his chest. His breath leaves his mouth in short, erratic gasps, his hands are sweaty and his knees feel like they've been filled with jelly, yet he's determined not to let him out of sight. His foremost duty would be to smite the Adversary, not allow him as much as a tiny mischief, let alone something serious, but Aziraphale wouldn't be able to do it even if his sole existence depended on it right now. No, not before he finds out what it all means.  _If_  he ever finds out at all.

Immersed deep into his thoughts, Aziraphale barely notices that they've left the market and now are navigating through a labyrinth of much less crowded narrow streets confined between squat buildings. He also misses the moment the demon discreetly extracts a dagger from the folds of his robe and momentarily disappears out of sight. The next thing Aziraphale knows is that he's being grabbed and manhandled in such way that he ends up trapped between a wall, with his face pressed to its sun-heated bricks, and the demon in question. The latter twists his arms behind his back while the entire weight if his body pushes Aziraphale into the hard, hot surface of the wall. 

There's also the sensation of warm metal against his throat. And then it stings, suddenly and mercilessly, and Aziraphale gasps, both in pain and surprise, feeling a trickle of his own blood running down over his skin. He gulps, struggling to grapple with the mere realisation of just how outright stupid he must have been to actually allow the other one to trap him this easily. There's also another thing he's got to struggle with, and that one is that he's being treated like this by  _him_.

_It's not him,_  the voice of reason all but shrieks inside his head.  _There's nothing of him left in this Hellish creature!_

Aziraphale ignores it the best he can because it seems to him if he gives in, surrenders to it, listens to this voice properly, he'll certainly lose his sanity for good – there's way too much going on, even for a being of ethereal persuasion. It's him and not him at the same time, it's the serpent from the Garden and his Adversary here on Earth, he's this demon about to slit his throat in this stinking back alley and the angel Aziraphale once knew, the angel that once loved him.

"What the blessed hell do you want with me, angel?" the demon hisses into his ear, way too close for comfort, his words a hot puff of moist breath against Aziraphale's skin.   
  
_Angel_. Aziraphale squeezes his eyes shut, fighting another wave of vertigo.  _Angel, he used to call me that when we were alone, back in Heaven,_ he thinks, on the verge of letting out a truly hysterical little chuckle because now there's another sting, this time in his eyes, as bitter tears prickle there, ready to spill.   
  
To his surprise, though, the demon doesn't sound particularly intimidating, which makes it all even more difficult to comprehend and harder to bear. Or perhaps he does, and it's just that Aziraphale's mind refuses to get over the fact that he's being threatened and hurt by the same being who once loved him. If _he is the same being,_  that little voice inside his head repeats, but Aziraphale knows better than that.  
  
"If you really think I haven't noticed you following me, you're a bloody fool. And that's a rather sorry attempt at disguising yourself, too."

"I would appreciate it greatly if you were so kind as to take that knife off my throat," Aziraphale gasps, trying to articulate it so that he doesn't accidentally cut himself on the blade even more.

"Fat chance," the demon huffs, pressing the dagger even more firmly into the tender skin of Aziraphale's throat. The angel feels the hair on the nape of his neck stand on end. "What do you want with me?"

"Nothing," Aziraphale breathes out, feeling more blood run down his neck and soaking his tunic.

It's not even a lie – he's so utterly confused he doesn't understand what exactly he wanted to achieve when he followed the demon in the first place. He has to come up with something, though, something realistic enough to pass for truth to avoid being discorporated or, in the worst-case scenario, murdered here. He doesn't have enough experience with demons to know for sure what they're apt to do to an angel in a situation like this. Probably, eliminate them out of existence, for all he knows, but his mind simply refuses to accept that.

"I saw you and… I just thought I'd say hello," he invents on the go.

That sounds like the sorriest excuse he could have come up with in the current circumstances, but, miraculously, the demon's hold on him loosens enough to let Aziraphale turn around. If it were someone else, some other demon, what Aziraphale would do next would be attack, immediately, without giving the fiend a chance to understand he's made a mistake. He's got the skill for it, after all, he's one of the Heavenly host and he used to wield that flaming sword in what now seems to be another lifetime. As it is, however, all he does is simply stare at the demon in front of him, taking a proper eyeful of him, and two things become absolutely clear to him almost instantaneously.

The first one is that it's  _him_ indeed. There's no mistaking the being in front of him for anyone in this entire universe. Aziraphale doesn't know how he knows it, he just does. He simply feels it, on some inner level of his being, and, vaguely, he wonders whether those who Fell have still managed to preserve some minuscule part of their souls, some barely kindling spark of goodness left in them. He wonders whether those Fallen ones remember anything, Heaven and what had been Before. He wonders whether the being staring back at him with those strange eyes of his _knows_ him.

Aziraphale has no answers to any of those questions, but he's sure he does know one thing – it's  _him,_ snake eyes or not. It's not even that he looks almost exactly the same as he used to. It's as if there was a string attached to Aziraphale's soul leading to him, a string somebody neglected or failed to severe. It's still there, all right, just like it's always been. Perhaps, it's not even that surprising – they were, after all, soulmates. Incredibly, he thinks he can even pick up on some of the demon's emotions right now, as he stands right in front of Aziraphale with his dagger clutched in his hand ready to attack. He  _means_  to attack, the angel feels, should he be provoked. But he can also detect curiosity and some sort of amusement in his aura, which, if nothing else, is a little reassuring. 

The second realisation the angel has – and much less reassuring at that – is that his counterpart doesn't remember him, doesn't remember any of what had been Before. Aziraphale has no idea how he knows that, either. He just knows. Perhaps it's all thanks to that link which makes it possible for the angel to recognise the aura of the other, he knows there's absolutely no recognition on the demon's part. To him, Aziraphale is nothing but a stranger. Not a complete stranger, not if he's right about his assumption that these snake yellow eyes are the same set which looked at him from the body of a serpent back in the Garden, but he is a stranger nonetheless. 

Aziraphale can't take his eyes off him, can't help marvelling at how he looks almost exactly the same. It's those same cheekbones, nice and sharply-defined, that same pointy nose, those same full lips which would so often greet him with a slightly crooked but no less affectionate smile in that other life; and then the eyes, almost the same colour but so utterly different, devoid of affection, slit eyes of a snake demon, but so familiar all the same, still familiar despite everything that happened. Oblivious to the cut on his throat that keeps bleeding, Aziraphale stares at this demon searching for at least some vague trace of recognition, of knowledge, of memory, but he's in for a disappointment – there's nothing of that sort on the other's face. If anything, he looks slightly self-conscious and a bit confused, his hand still gripping that dagger with the bloodied blade as he looks back at Aziraphale with distrust.

What makes it all worse is Aziraphale's own lack of memory, and that, for some reason, seems crucial to him, as if remembering his name could somehow ignite that spark of recognition in the demon. Aziraphale wrecks his brain over it, for at least some trace of it, some syllables, but it's as if it had never even been there in the first place.

"What's your name?" he mutters unaware of the fact that he's saying it aloud. "I  _should_  remember…"

One of the demon's dark, immaculate eyebrows arches quizzically. The dagger still remains poised at Aziraphale, though.

"Can't blame you for forgetting it, it's been a while since the Garden, huh?" he says, drawing Aziraphale out of his mental struggle. " _Crowley_. Used to be Crawly, but I believe the new version is more suitable for…" he smirks and shrugs one shoulder. "For this corporation."

" _Crowley_ …" the angel repeats, as if giving it a taste.  _That crooked smirk_ , he thinks desperately _. Oh Lord_. "You don't remember…?" he breathes out, feeling a lump forming in his throat.

He swallows, doing his best to get rid of it. It's a stupid question; of course, he doesn't remember, if he did, Aziraphale would feel it, but he can't help asking it all the same.

" _You?_ " Crowley smirks, his voice laced with irony. "Why, how can I possibly forget you after you disobeyed His orders so spectacularly and gave that sword of yours to humans, huh? If I'm not mistaken, we had a very engaging sort of conversation on who'd done the right thing and who'd done the wrong one. You're Aziraphale, the Guardian of the Eastern Gate," this too, sounds a bit mocking, "currently Heaven's agent on Earth commissioned to take care of humanity and bust all my infernal plans and perhaps kick my arse from here to kingdom come whenever you have the chance to. Have I missed anything?"

With a weak, almost hysterical, huff Aziraphale closes his eyes and nods lightly. He's not feeling well. No, strike that, he's feeling positively sick. With a trembling hand, he wipes the cold sweat off his brow and then the blood off his neck and then wipes it all on his robe.

"How did you come by this…" he opens his eyes and gestures at the demon. It feels surreal, all of it. Seeing him here, totally amnesiac; him, being a demon; him, going by some strange other name; him, having these yellow eyes of a snake; him, talking, breathing, living, looking at Aziraphale without remembering anything at all. "This corporation?"

"Always had it," Crowley shrugs and finally lowers the dagger. "Yeah, I did tell you a few lies back in the Garden, not a low-rank servant in Hell, me, but, huh, what of it? I'm a demon, right? Lying's in my job description, after all," he smirks smugly. "Tricked you just fine, didn't I?"

Aziraphale wipes at the leaking cut on his neck once more, distractedly, and says nothing. He's torn between the absolutely irrational under the current circumstances desire to hug him and the voice of his common sense which tells him it's an absurd, perhaps even dangerous, idea. Meanwhile, with a roll of his eyes and an exasperated click of his tongue, the demon flicks his fingers, and the wound on Aziraphale's throat is healed in the blink of an eye. Aziraphale winces at the sudden, fierce, sting of it, demonic power surging through that place where the cut used to be, but that only lasts for a moment or two, and then there's nothing at all, just some subtle tingling left in its place.

"Don't get ideas about it," Crowley says before the angel has enough time to even open his mouth to voice his surprise. "I just find the sight of blood disturbing enough, so it's purely out of selfish reasons."

"But you were just going to kill me? Yet the sight of blood is disturbing?"

"I  _still_ can kill you, it's me who's got the weapon, right?"

"Why didn't you do it right away, anyway? You're a demon and I'm your adversary, supposed to kick your arse to kingdom come, as you put it yourself," Aziraphale asks, taken aback that he's able to produce anything out of his mouth at all, astounded that he's actually talking to a demon, barely able to wrap his head around the fact that he hasn't been discorporated by the said demon yet. He supposes it's just the shock of it all that keeps him functioning relatively adequately in these circumstances.

"You are, and I am," Crowley replies with a shrug of one shoulder, "but at the same time you are the only other supernatural being on this blasted planet, angel, do the math. Humans do tend to get a bit unnerved every time you refill your cup with a snap of your fingers, and I'm not even talking about my eyes. Besides, they are prone to dying every forty years or so, which is also rather inconvenient. I believe you're not susceptible to such things. Besides, I think I owed you one for not smiting me back in the Garden, so now we're quits."

When all Aziraphale does is stare at the demon without saying anything for quite a while, because he is simply stunned beyond speaking ability, Crowley rolls his eyes once more and lets out an impatient huff.

"Oh, right, it seems you might not be the brightest angel in the bunch. Just my luck," he sighs, sounding a bit exasperated. "It's boring on this planet, angel, and I wouldn't mind a company of sorts every once in a while. Besides, where's the fun in wiling around when no one's even interested in thwarting it, huh? What about healthy competition and all that?"  
  
"I don't believe you," Aziraphale finally murmurs, surprising himself.   
  
The demon – Crowley – gives him a pointed stare and then his not amused expression is compromised by a grin.  
  
"Well, that's a place to start," he says, hides the dagger in the folds of his robe and stretches his hand to Aziraphale, which the latter apprehensively accepts. It's lukewarm to the touch, which is weird enough given the boiling weather. "There's a tavern nearby where they serve a rather wicked sort of beverage. Fancy joining me? Judging by the looks of you, a little wickedness would do you good. Or a little drink, that is."  
  
In fact, Aziraphale can barely believe in anything that is going on, but he still says, "All right," and then simply follows Crowley.

*

They spend the end of the evening and a good part of the night in that tavern, with Crowley doing most of the talking and Aziraphale mainly listening to him, opening his mouth only when the demon asks him a question or to voice his own if he has one. Not that he's got many, though. In his shoes, any other self-respecting angel would most certainly do his best – that is, if he hadn't already smitten the demon in the first place – to entice some information out of him so that it could be further used by Up There, for the benefit of the Higher Purpose, but Aziraphale is no 'any other' angel. Unlike the rest of his brothers and sisters from Heaven, he can recall the one he loved – still loves with every cell of his being and every fibre of his soul – and now that, against all odds, he seems to have met him in person, he's way too stunned for anything but staring at him in barely disguised awe.

_Crowley_ , Aziraphale corrects himself silently, as if tasting this strange new name.  _His name is Crowley now_.

Somehow, it suits him well enough.

All evening through, Aziraphale's common sense cries that this Crowley simply can't be that angel he lost so long ago and cautions him to be careful, but he knows that this time around his voice of reason is mistaken. He understands the danger of thinking so; realises perfectly well that the being sitting across the table from him is the agent of the Adversary and, therefore, must be prone to deceit and betrayal; he acknowledges the fact that this is quite likely to be some sort of hellish trick in order to goad an angel like him into trouble, but then there's that other part of him, the one which still possesses the memories others were deprived of long ago, and it knows different. This Crowley, it is  _him_ , his long-lost soulmate, not an angel anymore, granted, but essentially the same being Aziraphale loved back in Heaven.

As of now, though, he doesn't have the slightest idea as to what to do with all this knowledge.

***

 


	4. Chapter 4

***

Over the next couple of millennia, as humanity slowly comes to grips with the world they're living in and adapts it to their needs and wishes, Aziraphale does his best to come to grips with the fact that his adversary here on Earth, Hell's very own representative, the creator of the Original Sin who brought about the Fall of Humanity was once an angel in Heaven, an angel Aziraphale knew, the angel Aziraphale loved. It takes him a long while of not knowing how to feel about it all before his innermost feelings finally prevail and there's no point in ignoring the fact that, demon or not, Crowley was and still is the closest being the angel has.

As Earth and its inhabitants evolve, they meet sporadically, running into each other mostly by accident, except for those occasions when both Heaven and Hell are interested in having their representatives in some particular spot. Mainly, it is Aziraphale's initiative to avoid Crowley – the demon himself doesn't seem to mind their intermittent encounters in the slightest and, more often than not, is the one seeking the angel's company first. All in all, Crowley makes a rather odd sort of demon, Aziraphale learns, what with his unwillingness to participate in human atrocities, whether provoked by Hell or humans themselves, who, as a matter of fact, are becoming increasingly good at it without anyone's helping hand. Nor does he seem to be particularly malicious – he does take pleasure in creating mischief and provoking all kinds of trouble, but that's rather low-scale trouble all things considered, and when Aziraphale's around, he can remedy the consequences of it easily enough. That is one of the reasons he doesn't see it necessary to actually keep an eye on his adversary – the adversary in question barely lifts his little finger in an attempt to become a real pain in the neck.

That's far from being the core reason behind his reluctance to encounter the demon, though. The fact of Crowley behaving the way he does, mainly deriving all sorts of hedonistic pleasures from earthly activities and simply enjoying his existence instead of actually carrying out his infernal duties is merely an excuse Aziraphale has for his bosses should they get suspicious as to why their agent doesn't keep a watchful eye on Hell's own representative. The underlying reason is that he simply cannot bear having to interact with Crowley given the circumstances under which they met on this planet. It's been a long, long time since those devastating events shook Heaven to its core, more than enough for Aziraphale to stop wondering why– there are way too many various  _why's_ ; why Crowley had to Fall, why they had to meet again, in the Garden, of all places; why they have to be stationed here on Earth, together; why Crowley had to forget everything that had been before his Fall while Aziraphale was allowed to remember it all, or why the only thing he was robbed of was Crowley's real name. There have been no answers, and there will be none, he reckons, so it's pointless to persist in asking. If this is how it's supposed to be, so be it.

He's managed to get over the fact that he'll never know, that's true, but the pain of his loss has never had the chance to subside, to be dulled by the passage of time. Instead, it seems even more acute now that he has to encounter Crowley in person, see him looking pretty much the same he used to in Heaven while being so essentially different at the same time, so he avoids the demon the best he can. It's much better that way, Aziraphale tells himself, it's much better to let his own memories fade to the point where they don't seem to be so profoundly vivid anymore, so profoundly painful, let them accumulate a good layer of dust, and then, perhaps a couple of millennia into the future, he will finally be able to face Crowley and interact with him on purely professional level, without this unbearable ache in the very middle of his being, without this yearning for the lost part of his soul, without pangs of conscience for  _knowing_  what he does about Crowley and about the two of them, for being able to remember what Crowley was forced to forget, for having to pretend all the time.

Later, perhaps, he will manage to be around Crowley and feel alright, but not yet.

All the same, they can't help running into one another from time to time, here or there. There's really no way to avoid it given their respective positions, and when it happens, Aziraphale is both delighted and devastated, an improbable mixture of emotions he's yet to find out how to live with. Him and Crowley, they share news and rumours from both sides, over a goblet or a jug of wine, in one tavern or another. Parts of the world vary, so do their clothes, so do times and traditions and seasons, but some things remain as constant as the moon and the sun and Earth itself – them, and their lengthy discussions, and their animated debates; Crowley's mesmerising snake eyes, radiating mirth instead of malice, and Aziraphale's cerulean blue, kind and loving; loving him still, loving him even now in spite of everything.   
  
Despite them technically being each other's arch-enemies, they rarely have confrontations, most of which can't really be called that way in any case. They're mainly disputes, which commonly end up with them sharing bread and wine; in the worst-case scenario, one of them, exasperated, leaves with no intention of encountering the other in the nearest few centuries. When those pass, they meet and it comes full circle again.

There is one incident, however, which stands apart in Aziraphale's memory, one incident horrible enough to deprive a celestial being of sleep, rarely though he resorts to it. Aziraphale doesn't dare to close his eyes for even a few minutes over the course of the several hundred years that follow it lest he'd be woken up by a nightmare, one which keeps recurring time and time again, making him bathe in cold sweat as he comes to with a violent shudder, gasping for breath and unable to produce a sound out of his mouth even though there's an almost formed scream ready to roll off the very tip of his tongue. He  _wants_  to scream; in fact, it seems that being able to do so would relieve the sheer terror of the dream, but he's deprived of his voice every single time, choking on unvoiced desperation provoked by being completely helpless.

In this haunting nightmare of his, what always makes him jerk into consciousness is the feeling of warm, sticky blood trickling down his fingers, pooling in his palm and then finding its way down his forearm, soaking his tunic; blood which is so red and so awfully real.  _Crowley's_  blood. On his own hands. Blood from the wound inflicted by his hands. Hands which would in just a second catch the demon's limp body, ridiculously, in order to prevent it from crashing hard onto the pavement, as if that could help. In his dream, Aziraphale keeps seeing the pain in Crowley's eyes, both the physical manifestation of it and the pain of betrayal, and it's always the hardest part. In this dream of his, Crowley dies every single time, for real, forever.

It's a nightmare invoked by events which really took place, and it's so vivid and accurate there's really no surprise that for a very long while afterwards Aziraphale gives up on sleeping entirely.

*

It's Gomorrah at its finest, and both sides have certain interest in the events which are occurring there.

Hell is bent on disseminating and popularising all kinds of sins among its citizens, who, as it happens, embrace each and every one of them eagerly. They eat and drink to excess, they want and lust and envy, they cheat and they lie and they kill and they torture, seemingly willing to master it all to perfection. Crowley has very little to do with any of it, as Aziraphale knows perfectly well. Humans don't really need his infernal enticing to commit atrocities, they make do quite well on their own. The demon is mad about the city, though, which doesn't come as a surprise, of course. It is beautiful and prosperous, with abundance of exquisite foods and all sorts of wines, with lots to amuse oneself if one is a demon who's particularly partial to creating low-scale mischief and then watching how its reverberations spread by their own accord. Mass corruption, he once called it, sounding incredibly smug.  
  
Unsurprisingly, in this land of debauchery, Aziraphale's side is having much less fun. As a matter of fact, the majority of angels from Up Above are swept by righteous anger and seek to punish the dwellers of Gomorrah and its sister Sodom thereby setting an example for humanity. Mass destruction is the heavenly answer to the mass corruption from the Downstairs, and the date is set for the Host of Heaven to attack and erase all those wretched sinners and then any memory thereof off the face of the Earth. The angel is both astounded and disgusted upon hearing the news, but it is not his place to have an opinion on the plans created Above, so he spends most of the last days the cities are allowed persuading those who still aren't beyond redemption to rescue their immortal souls and leave.   
  
There's also another matter. Crowley's currently dwelling in Gomorrah and apparently has no idea whatsoever about the scale of the atrocity which is about to happen, so Hell either doesn't know or doesn't care. Aziraphale both knows and cares enough, though, but it's still a challenge to figure out how to get the demon out of here without actually disclosing what's really going on. He could tell Crowley about everything which is destined to come, of course, even though it's against Aziraphale's orders. Over the centuries they've known each other, here on Earth, he began to trust Crowley enough to feel calm about revealing pretty much any heavenly plan to him, but this time, taking into account the demon's infuriating stubbornness combined with his genuine affection for the place, he might have some ideas about interfering, and that's simply unacceptable. Not because it might affect Heaven's business in the two cities – it certainly cannot, one demon is no match for the best and the furious of the Heavenly Host – but because the city is going to be teeming with angelic presence, which makes it a wrong place for a demon to be. They won't spare him, that's beyond doubt; they'll kill him quickly or, in the worst-case scenario, which is also the most likely one, they'll torture him to death. Aziraphale is not going to allow that to happen.  
  
The main problem is, he learnt about the entire operation and the scale of it way too late – it's just a few days before the designated massacre is due to begin. That stretch of time would be enough to convince the demon to leave the place weren't it for Crowley's absence, though. Which would be just fine if the demon managed to stay out of both cities for as long as Heavenly fires rage all over them, but Aziraphale knows he can't count on that. Crowley hasn't mentioned any intentions of relocation anytime soon, which means he could be back in Gomorrah any moment now, and the later he comes, the less chance Aziraphale has to smuggle him safely out of the city. Worried at first, the angel searches Gomorrah, paying visits to all sorts of seedy establishments, from taverns to brothels to prisons, but there's no trace of the demon, and this is when Aziraphale begins to grow anxious. As the precious hours slip by and Crowley still fails to appear in Gomorrah, the angel's anxiety turns into dread.  
  
On Gomorrah's appointed doomsday, Aziraphale searches the city tirelessly, sometimes scanning it from high above, watching it heave its final breaths, mostly running through the streets which are still bustling with life – devious and debauched, exactly what this place is set to pay for. His orders were to leave Gomorrah in good time before the destruction is due to begin, but Aziraphale ignores them doing his best to either find Crowley or intercept him on his way. As time is running out, though, the angel's chances of actually locating him are growing slimmer, and all Aziraphale is left to hope for is that Crowley is somewhere else, somewhere far enough from here to be safe.   
  
Not a single human he's come across so far seems to have even the faintest of premonitions about what's about to take place, but to an ethereal being the growing concentration of divine wrath accumulating in the very air to be cast upon the unsuspecting city is becoming harder to bear by the minute. That is why, just minutes before the action is due to begin, the angel reluctantly decides to leave it, praying that Crowley is, indeed, elsewhere. He's flying north-bound over the cityscape when he spots a familiar figure down below, walking along one of the dark narrow streets, now totally deserted. Aziraphale's heart leaps to his throat immediately.  
  
"No," he mouths because it's thudding so fiercely it's hard to speak, let alone scream. "No-no-no, not now, not now, please."  
  
But, of course, it is Crowley, Aziraphale wouldn't mistake the demon for anyone in the world. They've been stuck here together for long enough so that the angel could be able to recognise the other's presence in a matter of heartbeats. It must have been working in the same way for Crowley because, even before the angel's sandaled feet as much as brush against the ground, he's already whirling around to face him, eyes wide with surprise and alarm. His nostrils flare as if he's either furious and about to bare his teeth in a scowl or as if he's feeling the scent of something he doesn't particularly like. It's no surprise – the city's crowded with divine beings and sizzling with their divine auras. Not much for a demon to enjoy.  
  
"Angel," Crowley cries, sounding just a tad more relieved than he looks, and starts towards where Aziraphale has just landed. "What's the deal with all--"  
  
But he isn't allowed to finish as the next moment a huge quake shakes the ground below his feet so violently that he staggers. He keeps his balance but it's a close call.  
  
"Crowley!" the angel gasps running towards the demon, his mind working in overdrive as he's trying to come up with something –  _anything_  – which will allow him to sneak Crowley out of here before the carnage begins, but even as he's wrecking his mind over it, he knows it is too late.

There's yet another one of those mighty shudders and, all of a sudden, the night sky above Gomorrah lights up with a flash of such brilliant white that even the angel himself momentarily loses both his vision and orientation. A terrifying crash follows, somewhat similar to a thunderclap but much more vicious, and thus Aziraphale knows that it has begun.  
  
When his eyes get accustomed to the darkness again, he sees Crowley on the ground, cringing both from the flash and from the crash that followed it. He gets back onto his feet, though, fast as lightning.  
  
"Aziraphale, what the  _blessed fuck_ is going on?!"  
  
But when the angel reaches him at last, he doesn't answer. He's got no time to waste on talking, it's way too late for it. With any luck, he'll be able to offer Crowley all the explanation he wants later, but now they're running out of precious time. His foremost task is to get the demon out of the very damned –  _blessed_  – epicentre of it all, and it seems to him there's only one way to accomplish it now that Heaven's wrath has already been cast upon the city.

Swiftly, the angel extracts a dagger from the folds of his robe. The mere idea of what he has to do is sickening, but he knows it's for Crowley's sake. The ends, after all, justify the means, Aziraphale tells himself, and the ends in this case are Crowley's very existence. His discorporation at the hands of Aziraphale isn't going to be permanent, and Crowley will be back as good as new in a couple of weeks at most – just a perfect stretch of time to let everything settle down here. He'll be back royally pissed off at him, Aziraphale's sure, but ultimately not worse for wear, and that's the most important thing.  
  
Even though among the two of them Crowley holds the title of a flash bastard, Aziraphale can be lightning quick when he has to, and he is now. Besides, the demon is still slightly dazed, which slows down his reaction, and the fact that he trusts Aziraphale plays a cruel trick with him this time. It allows the angel to accomplish what he needs to – catch him unawares. Before Crowley has a chance to utter a single word, the dagger pierces his heart – a quick, clean strike, mercifully so – and the demon lets out a surprised gasp. His hands clutch at Aziraphale's robe for support as he inevitably sinks to the ground.

"'zzzssiraphale..?" he hisses, but it's a feeble, fading sound, more astounded than anything else.

And that's when it hits Aziraphale, the sheer horror of what he's just committed, even though he understands perfectly well that it was the only chance to save the demon from the massacre that's about to start here. Even so, once he feels the blade cut through Crowley's flesh, once there's that sticky warmth of Crowley's blood trickling down his hand, once he sees the genuine hurt and surprise and disbelief in the demon's amber eyes looking up at him through the gloom of the causeway, it hits him hard. He stares back at Crowley as the latter loses his strength and sinks limply down, into his arms, crimson flowers staring to bloom on his tunic. Aziraphale stares back in mute horror, ashamed, stunned and nauseated. He stares back feeling his heart flutter sickly in his heaving chest as bile comes up his throat making it hard to breathe and as his knees turn into jelly and he sits heavily down, still holding Crowley's very swiftly weakening body. The knowledge is still there, understanding that it's the only thing he could have done to protect the demon, but there's little consolation in it right at this very moment.

_"I'm sorry, my dear,"_  he mouths with lips so numb that no sound actually leaves them.

Crowley – his corporeal body – dies in his arms a few moments after, glassy amber eyes, much duller now without the demon's living force to light them, still staring up at him with genuine accusation. Aziraphale just sits there, knowing that he has to run but holding the demon's stiffening corporation close to his own beating heart instead.

What gets him going at last is yet another shudder that ripples through the ground, this time a more violent one, and yet another blast from above. He can hear distant screaming, which signifies that it has indeed begun. Before he runs, though, he allows himself a liberty which has never been and, most certainly, will never be allowed to him by the demon – gently, he presses his mouth to Crowley's corporation's cool lips, both a silent goodbye and an apology Crowley will probably never accept anyway. Then Aziraphale takes to the sky and flies away, flies without looking back, the night air cool on his tear-streaked face.

*

They meet ten days later – Aziraphale knows because he's counted them all, a long sequence of excruciating days and nights of Crowley's acute absence. One should think that, given the fact that they hardly ever meet more often than once or twice a century, ten days is but a blink of an eye, but it's not like that this time. These ten days drag by so agonisingly slowly, filled with worries and doubts and fears, and those nightmares, too, that Aziraphale doesn't really know what to do with himself.

As of now, the only traces of the two sin cities the world still bears are the smouldering ruins stinking of brimstone and a salt pillar vaguely resembling a shape of a woman poised amidst the desert. Aziraphale did indeed fly away without looking back, but it was still hard to miss the whitish glow of divine fires devouring the cities, and he dearly wishes he could somehow erase the entire thing from his memory. As far as memories are concerned, though, being forgetful is not among his flaws.

Aziraphale has fled towards the sea for one simple reason that it is makes a stark contrast with what Sodom and Gomorrah were, and his angelic soul is in dire need of something beautiful to soothe it with. Call it his little vacation until the Above come up with some other assignment for him, and, admittedly, Aziraphale cannot say he's looking forward to receiving one. If anything, there's been little difference between Heaven's and Hell's business on Earth; maybe in the great cosmic scheme of things there is, of course, or will be, but the means either side uses are pretty similar, mainly coming down to terrorising and exploiting humans in whatever way they deem necessary. What differs is excuses they invent to justify themselves.

Having spent awhile in the vicinity of Sodom and Gomorrah, Aziraphale finds the quiet rural atmosphere nothing short of blissful. He's occupying a modest yet well-designed and beautifully built house set amidst olive and orange groves with its own garden full of blooming trees and fragrant bushes, snuggled on the slope of one of the numerous hills which roll gently towards the sea. The house has a cosy little terrace, and that's where Aziraphale's currently sitting at his desk. The view which opens from here is breath-taking, especially in the mild rays of the evening sun, which give the green gardens below their lush southern quality, but the angel barely notices any of it as he's way too engaged in writing something on a rather lengthy scroll.

For the past ten days the only thing which has been able to distract him from brooding over what he had to do to Crowley back in Gomorrah is a half-formed idea of how such atrocious incidents could possibly be prevented in the future. There was nothing to be done about the last one as he'd been notified about what was to become of the two cities way too late and by some unlucky coincidence the demon was nowhere to be found so that he could be warned in advance, which in the end amounted to what Aziraphale was forced to do, but perhaps if they had some sort of agreement on how to act in similar circumstances, such predicaments could be avoided in the future. The scroll doesn't contain much as of yet, only a list of main points written in his neat, delicate handwriting under a simple title  _'Arrangement'_.

When Crowley finally arrives, Aziraphale knows it's him before there's any sound coming from the front door, knows it as perfectly well as if he could see the demon striding angrily through his little garden towards the entrance. He doesn't know if it's an ability pretty much any angel possesses, to feel the aura of the ones from Below for the purpose of protection, or whether it's only him who can sense Crowley, nor does he care. Being able to perceive his presence – albeit an utterly furious one – is an immense relief. A few moments later, Aziraphale hears the front door slammed. 

_At last_ , his very essence cries.  _Oh my dearest,_ a _t last_.

Much as he's delighted to finally meet the demon, Aziraphale's can't help but be apprehensive of his reaction. He tells himself – for the uncountable time – that discorporating him was the only possible thing he could have done to save him, but Crowley most probably has no idea about it and, thus, must be positively furious, and no wonder. Aziraphale would be, too, in his shoes. As he sits there on the terrace anxiously eyeing the lilies in the garden, he seems to be able to hear every single shuffle of Crowley's sandal-clad feet against the floor, and soft as the steps are, the angel can read the very pattern and rhythm of them to know that the demon is indeed livid. He's not afraid for himself, though, for some sort of vengeance from him which is, admittedly, to be expected in the given circumstances. What bothers him – has been ever since he had to discorporate Crowley – is the possibility of the deed jeopardising this inexplicable fragile balance they've achieved over the years. He's afraid – terrified is a closer term, though – that Crowley will shun him now, wanting nothing to do with a heavenly agent who has the nerve to sneak behind him in the dead of night and stab him to death. For all Aziraphale knows, that's the picture the demon must have.

The orange trees surrounding the terrace rustle in the light breeze, and the sweet citrus and flowery aromas along with that permeating smell of the sea practically any coast settlement is prone to are brought in in its wake. The evening light is soft, accentuating the beauty of the scenery as opposed to the stark brightness the midday sun normally creates here. Aziraphale shuts his eyes for a moment or two, breathing in the fragrant air and then letting it slowly out as he braces himself for the most certainly unpleasant conversation that's looming ahead.

Then Crowley finally strides onto the terrace, looking pale – no sunshine in Hell, of course – and somehow ruffled, his jaw set and his dark longish hair in uncharacteristic disarray. There are dark circles beneath his amber eyes, and those eyes are on fire throwing figurative daggers.

If looks could kill, Aziraphale muses, he'd be dead on the spot.

His second thought is that an angry Crowley looks astoundingly, unforgivably beautiful, what with his gaunt face and those blazing snake eyes. He has no right to be this beautiful considering he's one of the Adversary host, but Aziraphale knows better than that, of course. It's Crowley, after all, one who has a soft spot for lush greenery and good wine and who sometimes revives small animals just because, as he once admitted – while being drunk since he'd never have revealed such a weakness while sober – the sight of blood and death revolts him.

It's obvious the demon is not in the best of moods and he has every right not to be. When he finally reaches the angel's desk, he leans on it with one hand and points an accusing finger of the other straight at Aziraphale.

"You," he hisses through the clenched teeth. "You bloody  _bassstard_."

The finger which is pointing at him is trembling minutely.

As a matter of fact, Aziraphale had a sort of speech prepared, reasonable and convincing enough to make the demon see that he had no choice back there in Gomorrah, but looking into Crowley's furious amber eyes and remembering the nasty warmth of his blood trickling down his hand, all Aziraphale can do is stare. He wishes he could take this pointing hand and pull Crowley closer, pull him until he was safely secured in his arms, and hold him there, hold him and tell him everything, tell him just how horrible it felt to be afraid to lose him for the second time.

"Oh, will wonderss never c-sss-eassse?!" the demon keeps hissing what seems like uncontrollably and then adds, as if in an afterthought, "Firssst he sstabs you, disscorporates you, and now he hasss nothing to ssay! How come, angel? How come you're ssspeechless?"

"Crowley…" Aziraphale says softly, discovering that he's actually surprised Crowley's hands still aren't around his throat trying to choke him in revenge. Because, someone help him, the demon does look positively murderous.

Crowley's eyes are boring into him as he waits for an answer but when there is still nothing from Aziraphale, he goes on, a bit more composedly and only with an occasional hiss.

"I have to endure almost a fortnight in Hell and what do I learn upon getting there? That all the demonsss in Hell are actually celebrating the sheer cruelty of  _your_  people as if it's their blasted victory and not your side's pure madness. They've erased them both, both cities, with all the people in them, Aziraphale! And you what? Ssstood guard to it? Making sure no one intervened and spoiled your side's scavengers' fun? Decided to get yourself some pointss for getting rid of the demonic presence while you were at it? Did they give you a bloody commendation?"

The angel winces. Winces at the fury in the demon's voice. At the indignation. And most of all at how wounded Crowley sounds. Oddly enough, it's both upsetting and reassuring. The former because the last thing he's ever wanted to do is to frustrate Crowley that much. At the same time, his genuine indignation indicates that there is, after all, a place for some warm feeling in the demon's heart of hearts, no matter what he says he thinks on the topic.  
  
"But that wasn't like that at all, my dear," Aziraphale says at last, ever so quietly. And then, on the spur of the moment and against his better judgement, he reaches out and wraps his fingers around Crowley's wrist, gently. The latter gives a start but does nothing to extricate his hand out of Aziraphale's careful hold. "I do imagine what it looked like to you, an attempt – and cowardly at that, too – to get rid of anyone who could possibly meddle with the Heaven's business in those cities, but I had completely different motives to do what I did to you. I had no choice, my dear."

"Just what the…  _sssomething_  are you talking about?"

For a change, Crowley does look a bit put off balance. Maybe it's Aziraphale's hand on his, maybe what Aziraphale has just said, but he suddenly seems more perplexed than angry. Then his gaze shifts towards their joint hands and he winces, pulling his away abruptly.

"That's way too much angelic aura for my liking," he mutters with a rather confused expression on his face, rubbing at his wrist distractedly. "Stop doing it, angel, I've had enough trouble from you already to have to bear with… with  _this_ ," he waves his hand vaguely in front of Aziraphale as if it explains everything.

In a way, it does, of course.

Aziraphale is an angel, after all, and it's all about love for him – well, most of the time, anyway. With Crowley, though, there's always more to it than your regular portion of all-encompassing angelic love. There's very specific sort of affection and fondness, emotions so profound he's barely able to contain them; and it's certain Crowley is capable of detecting them on one level of his being or another. Aziraphale doesn't know if the demon's able to interpret them the right way, but over the years it's become clear to him that, no matter whether he understands them or not, they do make Crowley feel uncomfortable.

"I'm sorry," Aziraphale sighs.

"Of all things you could've done discorporating me was the least bloody necessary!" Crowley rolls his eyes and waves his hand again, this time as if dismissing the angel's apology. He still sounds resentful but it's as if he's being resentful just in spite. "What was it all about? I didn't even know such a clusterfuck was coming! I hadn't been in Gomorrah for a week, I'd just returned there! It's not like I'd have had one chance in hell of interfering with that atrocity your people did, nor would I've wanted to do it. I'm not that much into suicide."

"Your interference was the last thing which bothered me," Aziraphale says, wondering silently what sorts of emotions are showing in his eyes.

"Excuse me?" Crowley asks, sounding incredulous. "So what you mean is that you sent me to Hell simply for the… the  _hell_ of it?"

"Of course, I mean no such thing, "Aziraphale sighs and gets up. "Do you mind if we'll take a walk around while I'm telling you my part of the story?"

"I do, in fact, mind." The demon defensively crosses his arms on his chest and takes a step backwards. "Lest you play some other dirty trick on me."

Aziraphale sits down. "Seriously, my dear, you should know better than that."

"Well, I  _did_   _think_ I knew better than that," Crowley shrugs.

"All right, point taken. As a matter of fact, there's not much to explain. The thing is, I needed you out of the city, and by that I mean  _completely_  out of the city, as far from it as possible, without any chance of your demonic presence manifesting itself at the least appropriate moment."

"And you just said my interference didn't bother you," Crowley inquires, one eyebrow raised in suspicion.

"Your interference in terms of getting in the way of Heaven's plans would have been of such minor influence that it could be dismissed anyway. But your interference in terms of simply getting in the way of Heaven would have been…" Aziraphale falters for a moment, looking for an appropriate word, one which will simultaneously show and won't show the demon just what sort of devastating personally for Aziraphale it would have been. There's no such word in any language he knows. "It would've been disastrous for  _you_. The city was teeming with angelic presence for anything to fail to go according to their plan, but had they come across Hell's own agent on Earth? Do you think they would have had any second thoughts about wiping you out of existence along the way?"

"Oh, for someone's sake, of course not, I'm not that dumb to count on that. But couldn't you simply tell me what was going on?"

"I'd have been happy to, but you were out of the city," Aziraphale sighs. "In fact, I did my best to find you, and failed. And when you finally returned, it was way too late for talking, don't you think? The city was doomed, and so was everyone in it, so I did what I thought was the only possible way to get you out of Gomorrah unharmed. As much as I'm sorry for having to discorporate you, I had no other option."

The demon looks at him for a while, lips crooked in not quite a scowl but something very close to it, and then lowers his eyes, saying nothing. Aziraphale waits for the penny to drop, but when Crowley remains silent, with that brooding and stunned expression still plastered to his way too pale face, the angel goes on.

"It did successfully keep you away from all the commotion which took place there, didn't it? I'm really sorry I had to do it that way, but…" the angel shrugs.

"I have one question, angel," Crowley finally says, looking now not only pale and confused and taken aback, but also a bit sick as the understanding of the gravity of the situation must have finally hit home. 

"Which is…?" Aziraphale prompts, knowing the question before it leaves Crowley's mouth. It's a reasonable one to ask in the circumstances.

"Why?"

The angel knows what this particular  _why_  is all about. It's not about why Sodom and Gomorrah had to be destroyed the way they were, it's not about the sheer cruelty of his side, it's not even about Aziraphale discorporating him and sending him on an unasked and unwanted vacation in Hell.

"Why?" he echoes Crowley with a not at all humorous huff. "Obviously, because if you'd got yourself killed there for real, I'd have to learn to tolerate your replacement, and that would be way too much fuss for my liking." When Crowley's eyes grow wider, almost imperceptibly so, Aziraphale smiles, mildly. "And because I didn't want the only other supernatural being here on Earth – who also happens to be my only friend – terminally wiped out of existence."

At this Crowley both winces and rolls his eyes, and how he can pull those two off simultaneously is beyond Aziraphale. The wince looks genuine, the eyeroll rather feigned, as if done in order to conceal the former.

"Oh that's just disgustingly sappy," Crowley mutters and shakes his head, which is to be expected from him, Aziraphale thinks to himself with a tinge of sadness. He's a demon, all right. Sappy is not what a demon having at least an ounce of pride and self-respect should be, even though Crowley, apparently unbeknown to himself, sometimes is just that all the same, but then again, he's not your ordinary demon. "But I believe I owe you some, after all."

"Well then, I'm glad the misunderstanding's been settled," Aziraphale chances a smile.

"Don't get too full of yourself, though. I'm not going to thank you for discorporating me that way. Something needs to be done about situations like this."

Aziraphale's smile grows wider still. "I am genuinely sorry, my dear, for causing all that trouble, but now you see that the ends actually justified the means in this particular case. As to something being done about it, I gave that something much thought while you were away, and if you care to listen, I still suggest a walk around the gardens. It's going to look lovely in this light and, if I might say so, you do need a bit of sunshine."

"And he even has the cheek to say  _that_ ," Crowley grumbles, but it's really only half-hearted. "You're quite a bit more of a bastard than I originally thought you were."

Aziraphale only smiles at his counterpart, immensely relieved, and takes it as a compliment.

*

As they stroll through the gardens and orange groves, the angel explains his initial idea of the Arrangement. As of now, it's nothing but a draft, main points outlined so as to make his and Crowley's co-existence here on Earth more convenient and so that such incidents as Crowley's urgent discorporation won't be necessary in the future. The demon does find it both wise and useful and also sort of mocking towards their respective bosses, which is always a bonus. Aziraphale's draft still needs quite a lot of revision, and they work on it long into the pleasantly warm and fragrant night, eating fruit and drinking wine at the open terrace, and only sometimes arguing about certain points. In the end, when the Arrangement is finished and agreed upon, it turns out the work wasn't at all as complicated as Aziraphale expected. They celebrate it in the wee hours of the morning sharing a final cup of wine, both relieved and just a tad surprised by how easy it was to put aside all their centuries-long disagreements.

Crowley accepts the offer to stay the night willingly enough and goes to sleep after they finish the wine, but not until conjuring up a set of luxurious silk sheets which would undoubtedly have an extortionate price had they been bought and not just wished into existence. Aziraphale stops by to check on the demon an hour or so later as his own sleep refuses to come. The last ten days have proven that every time he closed his eyes he'd inevitably be brought back to consciousness, none too gently at that, by yet another nightmare in which that sticky warmth of the demon's blood keeps trickling into the crevice of his palm. And even though now he is certain that Crowley is out of harm's way, safe and sound and not even particularly angry with him anymore, he still believes he's done with sleeping for quite a while.

There's really no reason for him to go and make sure that everything's all right in Crowley's bedroom, but it's not every night that he has him as a guest and he wants to be certain that the demon is comfortable. At least, it's what he tells himself, knowing better than that anyway. His main excuse is that he's been missing Crowley something awful, the feeling intensified beyond what the angel thought was possible by what he had to do back in Gomorrah. He simply wants to feel Crowley's reassuring presence and see with his own eyes that he is indeed fine, safe and sound.

He finds the demon totally out of it, sprawled on his stomach across the bed, stark naked and only partly covered by those fancy silk sheets. He's ever so slender, with his muscles long and lean, stretching in smooth curves along his body. His hair is a dark mess of loose ringlets. His skin is too pale for a being who's lived in the south for the past several centuries, but of course that's to be expected when one has spent the past few days in Hell. There's no point in denying the fact that he looks tempting, but then again, that's what he should be; Crowley, after all, is not only a demon, but the actual creator of temptation itself, so it's literally in his job description. Funnily enough, Aziraphale muses as he lets his gaze caress all those angles and long limbs, over the centuries they have been stationed here on Earth as representatives of the opposing sides, Crowley has never attempted to as much as coax him into something seriously  _un_ angelic, let alone tempt him for real. The biggest prank he's ever played in relation to Aziraphale is coerce the latter into drinking more wine and indulging in more sweets than strictly necessary for an angel. And the bitter irony is that, the angel wouldn't mind a little tempting.

Watching Crowley sleep, peaceful, naked, relaxed, Aziraphale is no stranger to physical longing. In Heaven, contrary to the popular misconception among humans, angels are more androgynous rather than sexless, and they do have their loved ones, but in the absence of the corporeal form, making love is more of merging of souls rather than bodies. As it is, though, Aziraphale's not in Heaven – in fact, hasn't visited for almost a century – and he is wearing his human form, so that warm fuzzy excitement which awakens way down south – a purely human thing to experience – is definitely  _not_  unfamiliar. It would be hard not to long for Crowley, after all, and, indeed, many a person, both male and female, had their heads turned by the combination of Crowley's good looks, suave manners and his eloquent speech.

Aziraphale isn't going to deny that he desires Crowley, desired him back when he was an angel in Heaven and has desired him still ever since he first laid his eyes on him here on Earth. It might appear unnatural to some, an angel yearning for one of an infernal persuasion, an enemy, an adversary, but Aziraphale has long stopped worrying about it. First of all, if this feeling was indeed a sin, he wouldn't be an angel anymore, but he still is, and, besides, he knows what stands behind this desire. This very telling heat down in his nether regions is provoked solely by the corporeal form he's in, even if he's been wearing it so long that it's started to fit like a glove, the borders between his ethereal self and his human form smudged beyond distinction by now. But there's more to it than just that, this heat is complemented by a different sort of it, burning in his very heart, and that's his love for Crowley, love he's cherished and brought through ages, love which had no right to survive Crowley's Fall but did in spite of it all. He wishes dearly that the demon could feel it, not in the way he feels Aziraphale's angelic radiance – most certainly mainly annoying and painful on occasion – but perceive it for what it really is, affection reserved solely for him, some invisible gossamer thread holding Aziraphale's soul bound to Crowley. He wishes he could tell the demon everything and wishes the demon could understand, but that, he supposes, is beyond possible. Which in turn leaves him wondering whether Crowley can at least perceive his physical longing. He's a demon, after all, he should be able to detect such things, shouldn't he?

At the entrance to the bedroom where his companion is sleeping without a single care in the world, Aziraphale stifles a sigh. If he is able to feel anything at all coming from Aziraphale, apart from the discomfort triggered by his ethereal radiance, he doesn't let it show, never has.

So the angel simply watches him, wishing he could but not daring give in to his feelings. In the darkness, he sighs again, ever so softly, inhaling the fragrance of flowers and aromatic oils, watches Crowley a bit longer, the way his ribcage expands and falls with his breaths, and then leaves as quietly as he came, murmuring a good night and a few blessings along with it. He doesn't know if God appreciates his prayers for, of all beings, a demon, but so far nothing bad has come out of it.

***

 


	5. Chapter 5

***

"I told you there's no such thing as love, angel," Crowley says, but, to Aziraphale's surprise, his voice sounds unnaturally soft and sort of wistful, as if it were him, not Aziraphale himself, who might be upset by such order of things.

"Crowley,  _please_ ," the angel mutters into his cup, almost pleadingly, doing the best he can to banish the bitterness from his voice. "We've been over  _that_  plenty of times, no need to raise the topic again, now of all times. It's already bad enough as it is."

"Yes, we have, and that's why I still can't wrap my head around why you wouldn't want to acknowledge it. You must see it, you're far from being dumb, angel. It's not  _love_. They'll sell you for thirty pieces, and you're still talking of love. It's mutual convenience at best. Look at what they do, time and time again. There's no love in it. It's all about lust, lust for attention, lust for wealth, lust for recognition, for power, you name it. All their interactions come down to lust and what they do because they lust for something."

When his rant is over, Crowley draws in a breath and takes a gulp from his cup, dejectedly. Weirdly enough, the angel remarks to himself, he doesn't sound pleased with such a state of affairs. There's spite in his voice which Aziraphale can't either place, or explain. He doesn't doubt Crowley's sincerity, no, he's more than confident that the demon means every single word of what he's said – what he's been telling him for millennia on end – but the amount of sheer despise tangible in his tone takes him aback. Normally, Crowley would sound complacent – after all, it's in the interest of his side to have humans ruled by their desires rather than virtues – and somewhat taunting, too, because he is just that sort of fellow, partial to some good old teasing especially if the teasing is directed at the angel.

Not tonight, though. Christ's crucifixion has apparently taken its toll on him, too. Aziraphale supposes it might, bearing in mind Crowley's general aversion to atrocities humans seem to have no lack of imagination creating, but the extent genuinely surprises him – the demon looks worn out and despondent, something no demon from Hell should have the right nor ability to be in the present circumstances. Yet  _his_  demon is, and right at this moment Aziraphale is suddenly overwhelmed with gratitude so strong he has to drop his eyes back to his cup of wine and conceal the emotion by taking a sip. Of all things Crowley could have become after his Fall, he became  _this_ , a demon with a spark of goodness still kindling in his soul, and the angel is certain that, no matter what is said about the Fallen, Crowley's soul is still intact.

"Yes, they do lust for things," Aziraphale sighs in defeat, wishing they'd drop the topic.   
  
They've discussed and debated love for as long as they've known each other – in their present respective roles, of course – and they've never been able to come to any sort of consensus on it. Right now, just a few hours after God's own son was crucified, the angel doesn't feel any moral strength in him to be able to continue the blasted dispute. He doesn't even want to  _think_  about love, let alone argue about it.   
  
"They sure do know how to commit atrocities, certainly better than you do, but they're also capable of profoundly selfless things, good things," Aziraphale goes on wearily. He's been over it many times, too, and he knows what Crowley has to answer to it.

"Rubbish. Underlying motives."

Aziraphale winces and shakes his head, slightly exasperated. A few stray curly strands fly around his head as he does so. "What about mother's love then? Brotherly love? Friendship? You won't negate that, surely?"

"Purely biological," Crowley counters. "Hormones, all that stuff. They're animals, Aziraphale. More sophisticated but still no more than animals driven by their basic urges, and most of those urges are far from noble. They've stolen my work from me, angel, they do bad stuff perfectly fine on their own. Your side might keep on deluding themselves into believing that it's us demons who incite evil, but I'd say we could learn a thing or two from humanity as far as wickedness is concerned. For someone' _sss_  sake, today is the proof, you saw for yourself what they did."

"It was meant to be, Crowley, you know it as well as I do," Aziraphale says so quietly it's nearly a whisper. "Good or bad, they'd have done it anyway. Had no choice in the matter, as you're well aware of, free will or no free will. Not in this case." And then, for some reason inexplicable to him, Aziraphale goes on, "What about you, then? You  _do_  love Rome and good wine and all these lush gardens back in Egypt."

Crowley actually huffs at that, incredulously.

"You're misinterpreting things. I'm a demon, Aziraphale. I  _lust_  after things. Rome's a perfect example of perversity and debauchery, of course I am mad about it. Gomorrah was, too, you know, until your side dealt with it."

The demon still says it with mild reproach, holding him partly responsible for what his kind did to the city, and Aziraphale grimaces; those memories still haunt him. The demon, more than slightly tipsy, doesn't seem to notice, thankfully. _  
  
But you loved me, once_, Aziraphale wants to say; his every fibre is practically crying out to him to do so, but he does not, of course. Perhaps, Crowley is right. He  _did_  love Aziraphale once, but he was a different being back then and now it's simply beyond his ability. After all, he  _is_ a demon. A good one – or bad, depending on your definition of good and bad in relation to demons – but he is what he is and he can't go against his basic nature.

"Well then, you won't deny angels' ability to love, I hope?" Aziraphale asks softly.  _Because I do love you,_  he adds in his mind.  _Have loved you since the dawn of times, despite everything, oh Crowley, cannot you see that?_

"Why would I need to deny that?" Crowley shrugs. "It's in your job description, which, if you ask me, sort of undermines the entire significance of it. And we've been talking about humans, anyway, not you or me."

To that, Aziraphale just sighs and shakes his head again.

During the course of that seemingly endless, absolutely fruitless, discussion they both get pretty drunk. Not too drunk to pass out, but enough to distract them from the horror of the recent events in Jerusalem and keep the conversation flowing. They start with the topic of love and somehow end up talking about Heaven.

"Do you have any recollection of it?" Aziraphale asks all of a sudden, and even though he's intoxicated enough for the alcohol to provide him with just the right amount of courage to voice the question, he's still way too sober to feel relaxed about it.

Crowley's always been rather close-mouthed on the topic of what he personally remembers about Heaven, and after a few futile attempts to get him to talk Aziraphale has nigh on given up on it. Presently, he can feel his pulse beating madly in his temples as he watches the demon from across the table they're occupying, not wishing to miss even the tiniest of emotions should they cross his face. That is, if there will be any at all – Crowley, after all, has mastered disguising them to perfection. There's that tell-tale aura of his, of course, but given that Aziraphale's quite drunk, it gets more difficult to read it. He could miracle the alcohol out of his system, of course, but, truth be told, he's terrified of having to go through it while being sober, terrified of the knowledge Crowley might finally want to share with him.

The demon doesn't answer immediately. He sighs, then scowls, then takes a good mouthful from his cup, looking pointedly down at the wine soaked wooden table top. His lips are pressed tightly, and there are creases running down from the sides of his nostrils to the corners of his mouth, ambiguously making him look both very ancient and inexplicably human.

"What do you think, angel?" he finally mutters into his cup, sounding bitter and still refusing to meet Aziraphale's eyes. "You're far too intelligent not to guess all by yourself. Give it a shot, why don't you?"

"I…" Aziraphale trails off and then swallows, realising he's so terrified by the prospects of  _knowing_ , knowing anything at all, he can hardly banish the tremor from his voice. "I'm sorry for bringing it up. Didn't want to make you uncomfortable."

Crowley huffs, but the sound has nothing to do with cheerfulness. "No, go on. Humour me since we're on the topic."

The angel sighs dejectedly. "Nothing? I think that would be… logical?"

"Spot on!" the demon grins with blatantly fake cheer, and raises his cup.

He sounds angry and spiteful yet again, and Aziraphale wonders why that is. Does it hurt him  _not_  to remember? Does he wish he did? Is he resentful? And if yes, of whom? Of Him? Lucifer? Of the whole Heaven up above?

Before Aziraphale understands what is about to leave his mouth, the words are already out.

"Have you ever regretted it?"

Crowley actually chokes a bit on his wine, and, belatedly, Aziraphale realises that he is actually laughing, and this time, it does sound genuine enough. Or maybe he's just pretending to do so, it's hard to tell in this semi-darkness inside the tavern and with the amount of wine flowing both in his and Crowley's bloodstream.

"For someone's sake, angel." He shakes his head and wipes his lips with the back of his hand.

"What?"

" _What?_  Why on this blasted green Earth would I regret? If I'd liked it Up There, I wouldn't have ended up where I am. 'twas my own choice, obviously."

"You said you don't remember anything? How can you know whose choice it was?"

Crowley sighs, exasperated.

"I… Ah, blast it, okay, have it your way. Who cares now, anyway." He shakes his head and, for a moment, Aziraphale's heart goes still in his chest, but that's only for a moment because then the demon goes on. "I don't have any recollections of Heaven, none whatsoever, nor do I want to. I don't know why it is so, maybe it's the demonic nature, or Lucifer's will, or the Big Guy's decision, whatever, I don't care. I don't give a bless as to what had been Before. It's all…" He gesticulates vaguely with the hand still holding the cup. The movement makes the wine slosh out onto the already dingy table. "Beyond, you know? We all made our choices."

"How can you know you didn't like Heaven if you don't remember anything about it?"

"Well, I just  _know_ , angel," Crowley retorts, sounding slightly more exasperated. "Why would I have Fallen otherwise? We followed Lucifer because we wanted to follow him. Apparently, Heaven wasn't good enough to make us want to stay. Can't say I envy either you or your lot for the chance to be Upstairs every once in a while, thank you very much. I bet I made a pretty lousy angel anyway, can't have been your goody-two-shoes type, no way. Wouldn't have ended up where I am otherwise."

There's something in Aziraphale's chest but he can't quite put his finger upon what exactly it is. Somehow, he labels the feeling as a mixture of relief, hurt and frustration. Crowley can be lying of course, he's proved his proficiency at it on numerous occasions, but he doesn't think he's lying in this case. There's indeed that carefree attitude of ignorance about him, the total lack of knowledge rather than purposeful deceit.

_What would you say if I told you you made a wonderful angel, my dear?_  Aziraphale thinks to himself, watching the demon take another mouthful of wine.  _What would you say if I told you that you loved and were loved, and your only fault was that you must have been way too curious for your own good?_

"Why are you so interested anyway?" Crowley's voice pulls him back into the stuffy tavern, back to the harsh reality in which God's son has just been crucified as if he had been some wretched criminal.

Aziraphale shrugs and thinks, what the hell. Ironically, between the two of them, he's the one who's going to tell lies. 

"Our memories were taken, too, you know," he says softly and takes a sip from his own cup, avoiding the demon's eyes.

"Huh? Why would that be?"

When he looks up, the demon gives him a genuinely confused glance.

"The thing is, angels were created pair creatures. Well, most of us, I believe, anyway," Aziraphale says carefully.

"Huh?" Crowley repeats. "You mean, you all had…  _what_?"

" _Soulmates_ ," Aziraphale says. "Friends. Beloved ones."

"Oh my," Crowley shakes his head and rolls his eyes. "Just how sappy can it get with your folk, look I'm on the verge of tears."

This hurts, too. Aziraphale nearly blurts that since Crowley used to be an angel himself, isn't it thus likely that he, too, had a soulmate, someone he loved before he infamously  _sauntered vaguely downwards_  and one who loved him and perhaps suffered once he was gone, but then he simply lets it go. He's more than certain the demon won't believe him anyway.

"Call it what you will," the angel shrugs instead. "I told you there  _is_  such thing as love, at least in Heaven, there is."

"Here he goes again."

"Anyway, no matter what you think of it, we did have soulmates and when the disaster happened… Unsurprisingly, lots of angels lost their beloved ones. It was devastating."

"So the kind Father made you all forget?" Crowley pronounces  _kind_  as if it was a curse. "How merciful of him. Then how come  _you_  remember it all?" he asks suspiciously.

Aziraphale smiles a small smile, and here comes the lie. He drops his eyes again as he's not certain he can be as good a liar as Crowley is.

"Just like with your lot, there are no memories of the ones we lost, precisely, about who they were and what their names were, but there is the  _knowledge_. Knowledge that we were robbed, deprived of a part of our own souls back then. It's not only betrayal by all of you which got everyone so resentful, it's that loss which added insult to injury."

"And you call it mercy? Making you forget?"

Aziraphale smirks humourlessly. He's been pondering just that himself, ever since Crowley Fell, and he still hasn't made up his mind whether it's a blessing or a curse, other angels forgetting it all and him still being able to remember. One thing he knows for sure though – even if it is a curse, he wouldn't have it any other way.

"It's less painful this way," he shrugs, not really knowing if he's lying or not. "You were deprived of your memories as well, but, as you said, you don't regret. Why should we?"

"We know we didn't care about Heaven. We'd have stayed there otherwise; wouldn't that be logical? I don't mind being where I am, no, not at all," Crowley says, and he sounds perfectly certain. "You, on the other hand…" he goes on and gives Aziraphale a studying look, all his mockery gone almost in the blink of an eye. "You seem  _sad_. I don't know about any other angels, nor do I want to, but every time we end up discussing your blasted love, you do get all upset."

_Upset_ , Aziraphale thinks.  _Oh dear, let me tell you about_ upset.

"Perhaps you're right, but  _not remembering_  them made it all a bit less tormenting, and  _knowing_ there used to be someone... It reminds everyone Up There about… Well," he shrugs. "About just how cruel your side is."

Crowley remains silent for a while, thoughtfully swirling the wine in his cup. It's not all that often that the demon doesn't find anything to answer immediately. Aziraphale doesn't say anything either, and he doesn't know how he feels about it all yet, whether he's relieved, intrigued, disappointed or something else entirely. Perhaps a bit of all of those. After the day's events, this conversation seems to have robbed him of the last bits of strength, and what Aziraphale really feels like doing right now is going to bed. There still might be that recurring nightmare of his waiting to pounce on him as soon as he passes out, but the angel is willing to give sleeping a try all the same. It's been a long day and he feels completely drained.

"So did you have one?" Crowley finally speaks, and his voice is all too quiet. When Aziraphale raises his eyes to meet his, the demon's looking straight at him with curiosity, head cocked to one side.

"Did I have what?"

"A soulmate. Before?"

For a few moments, the angel feels short of breath. There's a part of him wondering just how ridiculous all of this is. Just how more absurd can it possibly get? He actually wants to ask Crowley exactly that, just how ironic this is, their improbable meeting, first in the Garden, then here on Earth; Crowley's conviction that there's nothing he could possibly miss about Heaven; his inability to remember as opposed to Aziraphale's vivid memories of everything which had been Before and the fact that he perhaps is the only angel allowed to keep them? Just what on earth is going on, is what Aziraphale wants to ask.

"Yes," he says instead, his lips numb. His voice is not as steady as he wishes it to be. "I did."

He dreads the question from Crowley, he dreads he'll ask him anything about it, details, assumptions, descriptions. But Crowley doesn't. He merely studies Aziraphale for a while longer, and then says, even more quietly than before, "I'm sorry, angel."

And somehow, it's even worse, this unexpected sympathy. It makes Crowley,  _this_  Crowley, the demon, seem a much more real being than the one Aziraphale remembers from Heaven. _This_ is him now, looking pretty much the same, going by a totally different name, not having a single memory of Heaven; a demon who doesn't think much of violence and who's capable of feeling sympathy towards others, and all of a sudden, Aziraphale finds himself falling, falling helplessly without any hope of ever getting out of it; not Falling from Grace but falling in love with the one he's always loved, all over again.

It brings tears to his eyes and the desire to reach out towards Crowley and pull him close and never let go, so Aziraphale drops his gaze to the wine-soaked table top and screws them shut.

"Thank you, my dear," he smiles softly, but his smile is fake, and he wonders whether Crowley sees it, and if he does, what he makes of it.

Yet if the demon does notice anything, he doesn't let it show. He's been claiming that love is fiction for a lifetime, and even though he had been familiar with love Before, perhaps it's true that now he's beyond it and there's really no point in their lengthy debates on its existence; Aziraphale will never be able to make him see, and even if he did, Crowley would never accept it anyway.

***

 


	6. Chapter 6

***

The fifteenth century has something in store for the angel and the demon, something which they will try to avoid talking about for centuries afterwards, each for his own reason.

With the witch-hunt at its worst, Spain doesn't seem to be the safest place for someone who is sporting eyes the colour of amber and slits for pupils, especially if the said one tends to forget himself when drunk and fails to conceal the oddity with either a broad-rim hat or a bit of magic. The most logical thing, thus, would be to for Crowley to relocate to someplace else, a safer one where there are no persecutions. The demon himself doesn't seem particularly alarmed by what's going on, claiming that he wouldn't allow anyone to catch himself, and even if the unimaginable happened, wouldn't he be able to either scare the living daylights out of his captors, or trick them, or simply conjure his way to freedom with a little tweaking with reality? Besides, he tells Aziraphale, his side requires his presence in Spain to make sure atrocities are encouraged and don't stop anytime soon. The demon doesn't feel particularly enthusiastic about the total madness which has been taking place in Europe for the past century, let alone about encouraging anything of that sort, but he is still unwilling to leave. After all, Spain is warm and lots of action is going on.

In fact, it's Aziraphale who's been insisting on Crowley's departure, and to the demon's reasonable question as to who's going to handle wiling in his absence, he rolls his eyes – an infectious habit he borrowed from Crowley himself long ago – and states that, a) humans have never really needed his demonic encouragement in the first place, and, b) according to their Arrangement, Aziraphale can certainly keep an eye on what's going on and sort of give things a tiny push towards some wickedness in case everything starts to seem way too good. He's so desperate to get Crowley out of it all that he means it seriously enough. The demon claims that even if he does get caught, the worst thing that could happen to him is discorporation. That wouldn't worry Aziraphale much weren't it for certain rumours that the servants of the Holy Inquisition have been reported to resort to torturing their victims with Holy Water. It has pretty much the same effect on humans as normal water does – after all, it doesn't really matter in which to drown – but for Crowley it would spell disaster.

When Aziraphale lets him on this recent gossip, the demon does finally agree to leave Spain in favour of carrying out Aziraphale's share of duties in England. On the eve of his departure, they spend the night at one of the taverns drinking and talking as they've been doing for centuries on end, and when they part, Aziraphale entices a promise out of his counterpart to sober up and be on guard until his ship sets sail, which, as it turns out later, Crowley fails to keep. There's a trap waiting for him in the inn he's staying at and, predictably enough, he finally gets caught. Weren't he that drunk, he'd perhaps have a chance to escape, but he wastes the precious seconds as he banishes the alcohol out of his system, and by the time he is sober enough to understand what's happening, it's too late and he's captured. It doesn't seem particularly alarming at first, but when Crowley tries to free himself using spells and magic and they fail to work, he realises to his genuine horror that what Aziraphale told him about the novel Inquisition methods was right. Somehow, they must know they're dealing with no ordinary human being.

 

A couple of days after the ship which was to take Crowley off to England has long departed, a good part of the population of the town are gossiping about the Holy Inquisition's latest prisoner. Some say it's the devil himself; some that it's a woman, a witch, of course; some claim it's an incubus who's been preying on the local virgins, and others believe he's but a man with some sort of rare eye disease, but there's one thing which all those stories have in common, and that is the new prisoner's weird yellow eyes. Aziraphale's mind refuses to accept that it's Crowley, he should be on his way to the cold and distant shores of England, but just how many other people have slit amber eyes of a serpent, disease or no disease? The angel's heart sinks to his stomach and stays there with a leaden weight when he realises it's been two full days since the moment the demon must have failed to board the ship and set off on a voyage to the climatically uncomfortable but otherwise safe for demons England. Two days at the hands of somebody who's got access to Holy Water and apparently knows who they're dealing with since, somehow, they did manage to actually capture the demon in the first place.

It doesn't take the angel long to find him – there's one prison in town equipped with the Inquisition's tools of torture, where the unfortunate are normally kept and abused with the purpose of forcing out a confession which, as a rule, has nothing to do with reality. Aziraphale sneaks his way inside claiming he's one of the servants of the church and has been called upon to witness a confession should one come from the  _fiend._ He's let inside without much trouble – Aziraphale does know how to be persuasive when he needs it.

As it happens, he interrupts the atrocious act when he bursts into the dank, dimly lit chamber located in the dungeons of the prison. The participants give a start, turning towards the newcomer, some with small sounds of surprise, some with indignation, but Aziraphale barely acknowledges any of them. The sole focus of his attention is onCrowley and he can't quite believe what he's seeing. He isn't aware of it, but he's aglow with righteous fury, which makes the participants flinch and step out of his way. Some are shading their eyes, some even fall to their knees – his brilliance is nigh on impossible to behold with a naked human eye, especially when such brilliance is triggered and fuelled mainly by heavenly wrath and indignation rather than your cliched angelic all-encompassing love.  
  
Instead of hanging Crowley by his arms, as they're prone to when dealing with humans, his torturers suspended him by his wings, most certainly dislocating both. Aziraphale winces and has to stop in his tracks, suddenly nauseated and blinded with pain.  _Crowley's_  pain. He's always been able to sense his aura, and now feels as a blazing pulsing red mess. For a few moments, Aziraphale can barely breathe at all, both his throat and stomach constricting as if it was him who was hurt and bleeding. A few ribs might have been broken, too, judging by the purplish bruises on the demon's ribcage; there are more all over his body, too much damage done to leave enough power for him to heal them on his own. There are also burns on the inner sides of his wrists and elbows, and there's no mistaking where those came from.

Looking up at Crowley, half-naked, tortured and unconscious, Aziraphale feels so outraged that, for a while, he cannot even move. With an effort, he makes his mind stop wandering into the realm of what he'd want to do to the demon's captors. He knows he needs to stop wrath before it gets the better of him, but it's oh so hard when right in front of him, Crowley hangs from those ropes, covered in blood and unconscious from the pain inflicted on him by the exceptional genius of human cruelty. They might have been given a helping hand from Above in this particular matter, he suspects, and if his superiors  _really_  arranged this… Aziraphale interrupts his trail of thought with an effort. It's not his place to question Heaven's methods, Crowley would say with an exasperated sigh, but Crowley is unconscious and in agony and there's no one to make the angel's thoughts take a detour into some other, less dangerous, direction. Still, with a sheer effort of will, for Crowley's sake rather than for his own – because what good would he be to the demon should he actually be punished for such thoughts and Fall right here and now – Aziraphale smothers his anger. His primary concern is to get the demon out of here and treat his injuries before they get way too serious even for an angel to heal.  
  
"Out with you all!" he actually  _hisses,_  never taking his eyes off Crowley, his voice quiet but containing enough barely curbed fury to make those who are present scatter out of the chamber and leave him alone with their prisoner.  

Taking the spells off his binds is nothing challenging – a few muttered words are enough – but taking Crowley off the ropes which he's hanging from is, and Aziraphale's immensely grateful the demon remains unconscious. If he weren't, he'd have to put him through even more pain. The bruises and the possibly broken ribs pose little threat, but Crowley's wings are in a sorry state, and Aziraphale doesn't particularly like the sight of those Holy Water burns either.   
  
When Crowley's finally freed from his bonds, the angel wants to get out of here as fast as he can since the place reeks of blood, human excrement, and terror, but having to carry the demon in his arms – still blessedly out of it all – he must choose his step ever so carefully. So that he wouldn't inflict more damage to Crowley's already battered wings, he has to walk sideways through the narrow corridors of the prison. Once they're outside, however – Crowley still unconscious, Aziraphale still blazing with that angelic wrath – he takes off and flies them away, away from here, away to safety. He'd fly all the way to England if that meant far enough from human atrocities but he needs to tend to Crowley's injuries urgently, so he finally has to land. He spots a monastery from high above and lands smack in the middle of its cloister, giving a considerable scare to one of the monks. He reckons that, if Heaven was involved into what happened, they might want to follow them, and a monastery is perhaps the least likely place they'd think of looking for them at.  
  
Before the man has a chance to either utter a scream or quietly faint – and who'd blame him, that's a reaction to be expected from one upon seeing a furious ruffled angel with a bloodied unconscious demon in his arms coming down in the tangerine garden of your monastery – Aziraphale locks his radiant gaze with his, and the panic leaves the monk in an instant. Instead of collapsing, Louis – that's his name, Aziraphale fishes it out from the man's thoughts – silently leads him inside the living quarters, to an unoccupied cell, then brings in a basin of water and a few towels and leaves them alone. Aziraphale thanks him and makes sure Louis forgets all about what he's just seen and that he feels the divine presence and the bliss it incites all the way through the evening.   
  
There is a bunk in the cell but Aziraphale neglects it – it is way too narrow, and he needs Crowley's wings outstretched as much as the cramped room would allow – so he conjures up a simple bedding on the floor and cautiously lays the demon on it. It takes the angel the entire night to right the damage, fuse the broken bones together and heal the dislocated joints in Crowley's wings, mend the lacerated skin and soothe the burns left by Holy Water. The feeling of the demon's wings against the palms of his hands, feathers smoother and softer than anything Aziraphale has ever touched, takes his breath away and awakens that ever present ache in his heart, making it more acute now, making him miss the closeness they used to share back in Heaven terribly. The angel sighs, stifling this feeling the best he can – it's not the right time for reminiscing and feeling sorry for himself, he's got Crowley to tend to and any distraction means that the demon will have to be in agony for even longer.

Crowley comes around a few times in the course of this seemingly endless night, most likely brought back to consciousness by the sheer pain both from the injuries he sustained and from the divine power Aziraphale pours into him to make them heal. That angelic treatment hurts those from Down Below the angel knows from his own experience – long ago, he, thinking he was doing the demon a favour, used his powers to heal a small cut on the back of Crowley's hand, and the latter actually yelped in pain and surprise. The cut was healed, but the demon was less than impressed and not exactly grateful to Aziraphale for his help. Presently, the angel murmurs a few soothing words, promising he'll be done soon, but Crowley doesn't even seem to recognise him. If he were an angel, this divine power would relieve his agony instantaneously, but with him being a demon, Aziraphale doesn't want to even start to imagine what he must be putting him through. He has no choice in the matter, however – Crowley's injuries need to be taken care of. 

When he is finally done, feeling drained and with beads of sweat standing out on his forehead and his hands trembling minutely from the sheer effort of concentrating so hard on making it right and from the stress of having to not only see Crowley suffer but be one of the causes of it, Aziraphale is going to leave the demon to rest, wrapped in blankets to keep him as warm and comfortable as possible. When he wakes up, the angel thinks with compassion, all those previously broken bones, torn ligaments and dislocated joints are going to give him hell, and, combined with the residue of the angelic power he used to heal it all, Crowley's going to live through one or, possibly, a few rather nasty days. He's not allowed to as much as get to his feet, however, because the moment he makes an attempt to leave the demon's side, Crowley's cold hand ends up on his wrist. It's shaking and the demon barely has enough strength left in him to actually give it a tiny squeeze. 

"How the hell did you manage to pull it off and smuggle me out of there?" he whispers, his voice sounding hoarse and unsteady, as if his very vocal cords have been strained raw.

Aziraphale wants to shut the thought off but he can't help it – it forms inside his head by its own accord. Crowley sounds as if he's been screaming a lot lately, and it's just all too possible, isn't it? He doesn't want to go there, imagine what the demon must have gone through and how it must have felt, but he can't help it, and it causes another nauseous fit swiping through him.  _He's all right now_ , Aziraphale tells himself, locking his eyes with those magnificent amber ones.  _He's safe_. Crowley's voice might be raw but his eyes which are staring up at the angel are as piercing and warm and mesmerising as they've always been, and that's something reassuring.

_I've been keeping an eye on you ever since our first encounter here on Earth_ , is what Aziraphale wants to say _. It's always been me, not the universe._

"A slight of hand and some divine showing off," he murmurs instead and then smiles a little nervously, leaning in closer to gingerly brush a few strands of dark hair off Crowley's feverish forehead.

The demon sighs shakily and lets his eyes slip shut.

"Once a show-off, always a show-off, huh," Crowley mutters. "Your divine healing hurts like a motherfucker, Aziraphale."

"I know, my dear," the angel replies, apologetically. "It'll wear off in a while."

With his eyes still closed, Crowley nods lightly. "Don't try it on me again."

"Don't get yourself into such situations, and I won't have to." There is a smile on the angel's lips as he says it, but it's a brittle thing which conveys the extent of his fear and concern of the past several hours.

Crowley doesn't respond to it in any way, probably already on his way into the realm of unconsciousness, and he doesn't seem to have any intention of letting go of Aziraphale's hand either, so, not wishing to disturb him, the angel remains where he is, waiting for him to doze off properly and loosen his hold. That does not happen for a very long while, and this is what Aziraphale will later blame for what happens next; the fact that once in a lifetime Crowley – apparently affected way too much by the injuries he sustained and the subsequent painful healing – doesn’t shy away from his love.

After a rather long stretch of time passes and the demon's hand still remains clamped limply around his wrist, the angel does something which is dictated more by his personal desire and concern for Crowley rather than by common sense. He could have left long ago, disentangling himself from the demon without much trouble, he could leave now that he's surely asleep at last, but the angel chooses differently because he does not  _want_  to leave. Instead, as carefully as he can manage, Aziraphale stretches himself alongside Crowley, trying to accomplish it so that his hand still remains in Crowley's hold. He has no intention of falling asleep himself, just stay here and make sure the demon's doing fine – at least that's what he tells himself as he settles down more comfortably next to his companion. Yet, even though he wasn't planning on it, he does pass out after a while, exhausted because his own powers have been drained considerably and lulled into sleep by the even pattern of the demon's breathing.

It's hard to say how much time has passed before Aziraphale wakes up, but now the cell is filled with listless greyish light. There's a monotonous hum coming out from somewhere, and it takes the angel a while to recognise it for the sound of raindrops pattering against the tiled roof above, the droning noise tranquilising in its constant, dull quality. He's lying exactly where he was, with the only difference that now Crowley is snuggled up against him, the blanket half-thrown off thus exposing his slender upper-body which still bears the bluish traces of disappearing bruises. He's so close that Aziraphale can feel the warmth of his breaths against his own chest even through the shirt he's wearing, and the feeling all but takes his own breath away in an instant. It gives rise to the affection the strength and profoundness of which are so overwhelming that, for a while, the angel is totally ignorant of something else which has changed, something which is even more stunning. Once he comes to terms with having Crowley's face nuzzled against his chest, Aziraphale can finally acknowledge that one of Crowley's wings is now draped over them both. It feels ambiguously light and heavy above him, Aziraphale reflects in utter amazement, the soft black down the tenderest of touches against his cheek.

"Oh my dear…" he murmurs soundlessly, his lips barely moving at all. "Oh my  _dearest_ …"

There's that familiar ache, an old friend of his, in his chest, that old longing, the brittle shattered hope emerging back to life after just another period of hibernation. Aziraphale closes his eyes against it, though. He knows for a fact, from his own bitter experience, that this sort of hope is a way to nowhere, into the land of no return, into the abode of bitter disappointment.  _This_  doesn't mean anything; Crowley's oddly trusting position doesn't mean anything, his hand resting – not holding, no, not really, just lying there – on the angel's side doesn't mean anything and that soft wing sheltering him from the dank air of the cell doesn't mean anything either. So Aziraphale closes his eyes and shuts off his racing thoughts by force, making himself refrain from contemplating anything at all and simply enjoy this utterly improbable closeness while it lasts. He's more than certain that it's not going to last long.

It's dark when Aziraphale wakes up again. After blinking a few times, he can register that Crowley's face is not hidden against his chest anymore. This time, it is inches away from his own, and those astonishing yellow eyes are staring right at him, shining in the darkness as if from the inside. It's so surreal, this absolutely inconceivable closeness, that the angel struggles to come to terms with the fact that it's really happening, that it's not some desperate dream of his. At the same time, he's acutely aware of a myriad of smaller things, his senses suddenly coming to their sharpest. He feels Crowley's finally warm skin beneath the palm of his hand, against every single fingertip, because the said hand lies on Crowley's bare waist. He feels the demon's chest expand and fall with the sequence of his inhales and exhales. He feels the weight of Crowley's wing above him, its touch soft and warm and incredibly tender. It has no right to be this tender, does it? He feels Crowley's breath on his own face, warm puffs of air brushing against his lips and nose.

Aziraphale's mind catches up when it's too late to change anything because his mouth is already upon Crowley's, and he's kissing the demon, ever so softly. The touch of their lips is sensational, so uncannily simple and warm and  _real_ , and, suddenly, the angel feels a sting in his eyes. In response to it, he only squeezes his eyelids more tightly. He cannot really believe this is happening, it cannot be happening, this must be a dream, him kissing Crowley in this slow, gentle, closed-mouthed manner, here in an ascetic cell of a monastery lost somewhere amidst numerous hills, them snuggled together on the floor, wrapped into such a comforting darkness, safe, close, together.

Weirdly enough, Crowley doesn't seem to be scandalised, or even slightly startled for that matter. His response to Aziraphale's kiss is just as slow and  _undemonically_  timid, but there's no surprise in it whatsoever, as if he's known all along that it would come to this sooner or later, but he can't have, can he? Aziraphale himself is completely taken aback by what he's doing. Never in his entire existence could he have imagined doing this.

Cautiously – because, perhaps, he's really dreaming it all, and one wrong abrupt motion might dissipate this sweet delusion, and, no, he doesn't want that – he kisses Crowley's full lower lip, and then, when there's no resistance from the demon, moves to the upper one, and the most incredible thing about it all is that he allows him to, surrenders initiative and lets Aziraphale lead him into this slow dance of their lips, responding to single motion of the angel's mouth but not making a single attempt to take over.

There's a whole whirl of thoughts inside Aziraphale's head, but most of them are but mere snippets – how is this possible, why is it happening, is it real, is he kissing Crowley, he is, isn't he, his lips are so pliant, oh Lord, there's his breath on Aziraphale's face, why isn't he running away, why is he letting him do this, touch him, care about him, show affection, does he feel, can he feel it, does he understand what's going on, what he's doing to him by being there, lying there naked, so close, so languid, those kisses… Aziraphale's hand tightens its hold on Crowley's side, gently, but he feels the muscles under that warm skin literally thrum against the palm of his hand and, acting by some ancient instinct which has no right to be controlling him, he presses himself into Crowley, into his lithe body, mouth on mouth, finally taking this kiss a step further.

Then, what feels like a whole eternity later, Crowley's tongue sneaks –  _snakes_ – past Aziraphale's lips, slick and startingly nimble, twisting and brushing against his teeth, and, suddenly, Aziraphale can sense the true, much more primordial, much more innate side of his lifelong companion. He gasps into the demon's mouth, stunned by the utterly novel sensation, dark and somehow syrupy, engulfing and then captivating him like a sea of molasses, not allowing him to retreat, not anymore. Aziraphale should have backed off earlier if he wanted to, but he didn't want it then and he doesn't want it now. A moment later, there are Crowley's hands on the back of his head, fingers entangling themselves into his curls, and Crowley's naked body pressing into him with sudden, fierce urgency, slim but strong and graceful, and then there's also the tell-tale hardness pressing and pulsing against the angel's thigh, and, no, Aziraphale does not want it to stop. In response to the demon's closeness, the angel feels himself grow harder below the waist, too. No effort is required for that, no, none at all.

This darkness of Crowley's desire is entrancing, and Aziraphale realises, oddly detached while being literally devoured by him, pushed onto his back and pressed into the bedding on the floor, that this is what  _lust_ is. He can practically taste it on the very tip of the demon's tongue, bitter and fiery and terrifying. Yet, the angel reflects, in the same detached manner somewhere at the back of his mind while his hands keep tracing the outlines if Crowley's body and his tongue and lips keep caressing every part of the demon they can find,  _yet_ , even though he can  _feel_  Crowley'slust, it's not a part of  _himself_. It's a stunning realisation, and it brings an immense relief in its wake. Aziraphale doesn't have time to fully understand it now, understand just how close he's come to forsaking it all for Crowley's sake. He will, later, but not now; now the knowledge is merely reassuring. It's not lust, not  _his_ lust anyway; it's engulfing him from head to toe and it's almost agonising for an angel to feel, making his heart hammer heavily in his chest, but it belongs solely to Crowley. And it's not all, either. There's another emotion, another flavour to what they're doing, which comes strictly from him, and it is  _love_.  _His_ love, preserved and cherished and brought through millennia, his love for the being he's holding in his arms, his only true friend and life-long companion, Crowley or whichever name he went by Before.

Coincidentally, once the angel manages to capture this particular thought, Crowley gasps and shivers against him with his entire slender body, letting out an uncharacteristically soft and plaintive sound, both pushing Aziraphale away and somehow pulling him closer at the same time. Aziraphale is too far gone, though, immersed into his own feeling of love and affection, to be able to interpret it for what it truly is, the sound of pure longing, terrified as much as it's desperate.

Longing and something else, something Crowley will refuse to acknowledge – let alone understand – for hundreds of years afterwards. Later, Aziraphale will come to an uneasy conclusion that he should have thought twice before allowing himself to do what he is doing now, but later he will be able to judge things slightly more soberly, and now he's anything but sober, intoxicated by this unimaginable intimacy, overwhelmed by Crowley's presence in such proximity, infatuated more than he's ever been. It's a very human sort of thing to be, but Aziraphale has spent millennia among humans, millennia in a human form, too, so perhaps it's no surprise at all that he's being driven by all those emotions, helplessly. In any case, it's not what occupies the angel's mind at this very moment. The only thing there is Crowley, very much naked, very much present, very eager, twisting and turning in his arms, pressing himself even closer, gasping for breath into Aziraphale's mouth; so very solid and alive and real.

Human shape gives an inexplicable, vivid taste to pretty much everything – both he and Crowley suppose that it's some sort of apology from Himself for making their lives so fleeting – so the experience of making love – or lust, depending on your side – is, of course, not an exception. Aziraphale has always suspected it might take the entire thing to a whole new level, but he could have never imagined it would be like this, making him want to  _scream_  from the sheer, unbearable pleasure of it.

It's not only the exultation of a soul from the bliss of being able to share this pleasure with someone he loves, it's also an intensely physical sensation, more acute and concrete and overwhelming than anything he's ever experienced, and it takes the angel's breath away, quite literally so.

When his own clothes are sent elsewhere – he doesn't really know whose doing it is, his or Crowley's – and there's only the sensation of skin on skin, his seeming to be burning hot, the demon's lukewarm against his, Aziraphale is deprived of the remains of his ability to think coherently. At some point, he ends up on top of Crowley, accommodating himself in between those long legs that don't hesitate to wrap around his hips and unambiguously pull him even closer. He moves back to throw a glance so full of uncurbed love and affection no demon in this world should be able to withstand, looking down upon him as if he's never before seen anything more magnificent. Crowley's stunning eyes are shining feverishly in the darkness, open wide and staring back at him without blinking, his soft, silky hair is a mess against the bedding, his cheeks and lips are flushed and cheekbones are standing prominently out, his body, still possessing the scars from his latest predicament, lean and agile and beautiful, with his chest heaving and visibly reverberating from the mad hammering of his very human heart inside it, his wings spread out beneath him, a stark contrast of their raven-black feathers against the floor.

Centuries later, Crowley will finally tell him he was terrified, rendered speechless and practically paralysed by the fear of the sheer angelic radiance; totally incapacitated by the magnitude of love that Aziraphale was radiating, but right now the angel is unaware of any of those feelings and emotions Crowley's going through. Right now, he sees the demon as the most beautiful and precious being in the universe, and he feels the demon's desire, feels the physical manifestation of it pressing against his lower stomach, feels it throb, feels it in the urgent way Crowley's hands are clamped on his shoulders as he pulls him down, pulls him closer, feels it in the needy, greedy kisses Crowley steals from him and in the desperate, almost melodic in their wanton quality sounds he makes, and he's not sure he'd be able to stop now even if he really needed to. Very far back in his mind he's aware that he's making love to a demon, of all places, in a monastery, perhaps under a crucifix on the wall; he's making love to a demon and he's the one who initiated it all; he's making love to a demon and perhaps he'll Fall for it, but right at this moment none of that matters.

They don't exchange a single word, but there doesn't seem to be any need for talking anyway, not now. Aziraphale is totally lost in the sensation, in the feeling of Crowley against his own body, so real and so demanding; in the soft touch of the demon's lips and the sharp graze of his teeth on his skin, in his hands clutching on his upper arms or sliding back to massage his shoulder blades in the place where his wings would join his body were they manifested, in Crowley's kisses, so hungry and needy but so awfully, astonishingly tender, in Crowley's eyes, looking huge and bright and hypnotising in the darkness around them, in those sounds he lets out, hushed and so unexpectedly desperate as his hips meet every single thrust Aziraphale makes. 

When it's over and they crash together in one sweaty, gasping heap, Aziraphale rests his forehead on Crowley's chest, marvelling at how madly his heart is hammering inside it, totally out of breath and with his skin hot and clammy. It's all so very human, all this mess they've created, and those very human hormones are still circulating through his bloodstream, overwhelming him with all possible kinds of emotions – love, desire, affection, tenderness, trust all rolled in one huge, profound feeling. Right at this very moment, he thinks he can finally understand humans with all their outwardly insignificant little dramas. To him, they don't seem all that superficial anymore. To him, when he can feel Crowley's semen sticky and warm on his stomach as he's riding this post-coital high, the mere notion that humans can actually survive despite the way they were created, ruled by instincts and emotions more often than by common sense, is astounding.

He moves off Crowley, with his arms still limply encircling the demon's lean frame and thus effectively pulling him after himself, and Crowley follows willingly enough until his lying flush against Aziraphale's side with his hot face buried in the crook of Aziraphale's neck. Everything is hot, the angel marvels, every single part of Crowley, who is normally coldish to the touch with his skin temperature on the tepid side at best of times, is now flushed and feels feverish. Aziraphale wonders if it's the residue of his injuries or of his angelic healing or the afterglow of what they've just done. And it's not all, it's not only his body temperature; Crowley's also all slack and relaxed and so astonishingly trusting, tender and affectionate, clinging to him instead of shying away from him. It feels like a dream, the best dream he's ever had, so he hugs Crowley tight as if in an attempt to keep him where he is if –  _when_  – this dream should be over.

In a way, hugging Crowley this way, a naked, exhausted and properly-loved Crowley, is somehow not unlike holding a big snake. Aziraphale can feel the pleasant heaviness of his lithe warm body against his own, and, strangely, skinny as Crowley is, the sensation of him against himself is inexplicably soft. Aziraphale closes his eyes and pulls in a lungful of the demon's scent, that dark, bitter, leathery smell which most probably should seem revolting to an angel but is not to Aziraphale. On the contrary, he loves it, just like he loves every little thing about Crowley. It's always been associated with him. It's the smell of  _not_  being lonely on this planet, the smell of  _home_.

Crowley lies splayed almost on top of him now, one leg hooked over the angel's, the other pressed tightly against Aziraphale's, with his torso half on top across Aziraphale's chest, one arm thrown over it and his fingers tangled in Aziraphale's curls, and he also feels the soft press of Crowley's flesh against his hip. All that is sensational in its own right, of course, but there is another thing which makes Aziraphale feel like he's both dying and being resurrected at the same time. It's the demon's breath, landing softly against his ear, warm and light and so improbably trusting. It has intimacy about it which Aziraphale has long lost the memories of, intimacy he has never even expected to experience again, not with Crowley being a demon, not with Crowley who forgot everything that had been Before, not with Crowley who forgot  _him_.

They fall asleep entangled into each other's limbs and wrapped into the demon's now completely healed wings, with Aziraphale's lips pressed to Crowley's forehead, with Crowley's hand resting possessively on the angel's bare hip, squeezing it even in his sleep. It's the long-lost happiness, the bliss which he has given up any hope of experiencing ever again, and as Aziraphale drifts off to sleep, he consciously makes an effort to enjoy every single passing moment of it, relish every breath Crowley takes, savour the warmth that's settled in between their very naked, very human bodies.

When Aziraphale passes out at last, it's like being given a taste of Heaven again, the Heaven in which both he and Crowley have been granted a chance to exist together. When he falls asleep, he is truly happy, for the first time in millennia.

Which cannot be said about the moment of his waking up. First, even before he opens his eyes, he's aware of the acute emptiness beside him, and despite the stuffy, close air in the cell, he's feeling cold. When Aziraphale finally dares to face the world and unsticks his eyelids, the morning greets him with bleak listless light and such an acute feeling of loneliness he isn't able to stifle a soft despondent groan. The bedding they slept on, as well as the cell itself, is indeed devoid of the other's presence, and even though Aziraphale knows perfectly well that Crowley has left, he still calls out his name, quietly, hoping despite his better judgment. Of course, silence is the only answer he gets. To him, though, this silence is more eloquent than any words could possibly be, speaking volumes and explaining pretty much everything. 

_The bloody snake_ , Aziraphale thinks bitterly.  _The bloody sneaky serpent._

"Bugger," he murmurs under his breath and closes his eyes again, rubbing at them with the heels of his hands, feeling cold, abandoned and absolutely ridiculous as he lies naked on the floor in the middle of a monk's cell in a monastery.

There is a vague realisation somewhere at the very back of his mind that he must have been the first angel ever who actually tempted a demon; and whom, not just  _any_  demon,  _the_  demon, the Original Tempter himself, apparently scaring the living daylight out of the latter in the process. There's also a thought that he might have Fallen for it, perhaps  _should_   _have_ , but Aziraphale dismisses it even before has a chance to be formed properly. He knows perfectly well he is still an angel, as divine as he's ever been, and he knows why – perhaps, for the same reason Crowley has fled. Aziraphale  _loves_  him.

_Love him, my arse_ , the angel thinks bitterly, and it's Crowley's voice which says it inside his head, of course; who else could it possibly belong to, with that profanity seasoning it. The sheer idiocy of the situation combined with the profoundness of the loneliness he is feeling makes a single helpless tear run down Aziraphale's cheek.

*

More than half a century has passed before they meet again, and now it's Venice which witnesses their inevitable reunion. They bump into each other in a street market where Crowley's performing his fair share of low-rank wiling while Aziraphale's giving a few blessing, instilling faith and hope into the population of the city. They meet in a street market by pure chance just like it occurred on countless occasions before, and Aziraphale is so glad to finally see the demon who has obviously been avoiding him for nigh on seven decades that he doesn’t dare bring up the topic of their last encounter lest Crowley flees again. He greets the demon with a smile and a wave of his hand, pretending that nothing out of ordinary ever took place back there in that secluded monastery tucked amidst green hills.

He still wants to know what made Crowley walk out on him back there, he wants to ask him how he managed to pull that off without waking him up, he wants to ask him about what he felt back then, he wants to ask what he feels now, but he doesn't. He doesn't need to hear any answers to those questions, he knows all those answers perfectly well – Crowley didn't walk out on him, he  _slithered_ ; and the only reason for it was Aziraphale's uncurbed love he so desperately wanted Crowley to feel. The demon must have felt it somehow, to the extent he found it uncomfortable enough that it made him run like he did. The angel wants to apologise for crossing the line, he wants to tell Crowley that the only reason he did it was because he loves him, has loved him for eternity and for a while even before that, but he doesn't. The demon seems both glad and apprehensive upon their meeting, excessively twitchy and full of fake nonchalance, and never raises the topic himself. It hurts Aziraphale, but he plays along and pretends nothing extraordinary ever happened between them. Just like the Holy Inquisition is over and done with, so is this matter.

***


	7. Chapter 7

***

After the Holy Inquisition incident, loneliness starts to be even harder to bear. Sometimes, not always, though. More often than not Aziraphale's way too busy to even notice it, giving blessings, sowing seeds of good and hope and encouraging people to be virtuous. Work, after all, has always been the best medicine for any emotional turmoil. Besides, he has Crowley's company, almost constantly as of late, ever since they both settled in London. That he has Crowley is a miracle in itself and, normally, Aziraphale never stops being grateful for it. Yet, sometimes it works the other way around, too, especially when humans are particularly malicious, negating all his efforts, committing something so atrocious he could have never even imagined. At times like this, it is in the demon's company that he feels most abandoned.

Sometimes, he wishes Crowley could simply leave him be because when he wants a shoulder to rely on, to just close his eyes and hug and hold the demon close, not to provide consolation but to get it, just this once, to feel the solidness if his presence, to feel the companionship of another being just like him, to be soothed and comforted, Crowley cannot give it to him. Sometimes, he's angry with the demon for it. Sometimes, he is envious of other angels, those who remained in Heaven in the constant presence of Father, angels who do not have to deal with atrocities humanity commits, angels who are not obliged to see tragedies of their lives and deaths, so small and insignificant in the great scheme of things but so devastating all the same. Sometimes, he wishes he could forget it all, forget what was Before, just like they did.

But then he remembers that he is also allowed to witness all the miracles of human existence, their good deeds and their stunning inventions and their curious minds and their love, which, Aziraphale knows, can be more profound than that of any angel. And then there's Crowley, of course. Crowley who defies love furiously, Crowley who would never believe he was once capable of it, Crowley who doesn't remember him, Crowley who stubbornly pretends nothing at all happened back then in the fifteenth century but who still sticks along. Perhaps he's not capable of offering the angel the sort of consolations he yearns and the love he most dearly needs, but he is here, and Aziraphale knows he's incredibly lucky – devil's luck, they say, and isn't it already an irony in itself? – to be allowed to have him as a friend. Other angels have never had such a chance at all.

*

In the nineteenth century Vienna, one of the leading musical centres in Europe, during the short break between his continuous sleeping spells, Crowley teaches Aziraphale how to waltz.

Unlike in the prissy Britain, here Waltz is held in high regard despite – or perhaps precisely because of – its licentious, sexual connotation, which Crowley highly approves of, of course. The angel – if he were the proper, stiff, kind complying with the Heavenly standards, which he is not – should perhaps disapprove, but he doesn't. Quite the opposite, he's always been fascinated by dancing. He can sing fairly well – just like pretty much any other divine being – but dancing has never been one of his fortes. The one who was truly brilliant at it, back in Heaven, was Crowley, and it was Crowley who taught him to dance back when they both were angels.

Aziraphale has mostly tried to avoid any kind of dancing since then.

In Vienna, whilst walking through one of the gardens of the city, they stumble upon some sort of impromptu waltz performance. There are two musicians, a violinist and a pianist, playing for approximately a dozen of couples swirling in each other's arms. They stop for a while to enjoy the sight, Crowley not missing the chance to point out that such activities surely promote and spread wanton thoughts among people, to which Aziraphale only smiles and shakes his head. He knows better, and he knows that Crowley knows better, but he wouldn't be himself should he miss a chance to rub it in for the angel.

"But it doesn't make the entire act look less fascinating, does it, my dear? And anyway, we've talked about this, dancing is only a means, it can manifest love as well as lust."

Beside him, Crowley smirks, slyly twinkling eyes still pinned to the waltzing couples. "Why do  _you_  never dance then?"

"What?" the angel asks, surprised. Once upon a time, millennia upon millennia ago, he was asked the same thing, by the very same being. Back then, he answered very truthfully that he wasn't good at it at all.

Crowley half-turns to face him. "What  _what_ , angel?"

"Well, why on earth would I want to dance?"

"Why wouldn't you?" the demon raises an eyebrow. "Nothing stops you from devouring my desserts all the time even though you, for one thing, don't technically need to eat anything at all, and for another, you normally have your own dessert right in front of you. Which leads me to the conclusion that you do know how to do stuff just for the sheer pleasure of it, so don't give me all that nonsense about angels. So what about dancing? Dancing is fun."

After a short hesitation, just like many thousands of years ago, Aziraphale says the very same thing. "Well, perhaps, I'm just not good enough at it."

This time around, though, it's an outright lie. Perhaps he isn't brilliant, but thanks to Crowley's efforts back in Heaven, his dancing is bearable enough. The only reason he never dances is that it invokes the memories he's not willing to deal with, but the demon doesn't need to know about this.

"That's remediable, you know?" Crowley turns to face him, a complacent smirk plastered to his lips.

"Crowley, don't be ridiculous. You do know angels don't dance." It's another lie, they can and they do, but it seems he's having a go at it tonight.

"Angels don't normally go drinking themselves into total inebriation, either. But you do, as well as lots of other little decidedly _unangelic_ things. Bearing in mind all those generally accepted clichés, I'd say it should make you a rather lousy type of angel, but as far as I'm concerned, it's quite the opposite. Come on, give it a try. I'll teach you."

"You're insufferable," Aziraphale huffs and, taking Crowley by the arm, leads him away from the dancers, hoping that once they're out of sight, the demon will drop the topic. "It's dinner time, my dear, so how about I'd steal some of your desserts instead, what would you say?

"You're paying," the demon agrees, letting himself be led away willingly enough. "And I'm teaching you to waltz this very evening. Favour for a favour."

Aziraphale doesn't even make an attempt to suppress an exasperated sigh. "Don't you think it's way too many favours from me and none from you, the way you put it?"

"Well, perhaps, but what would you expect from a demon?" Crowley replies, sounding proud of himself. "I'm here to tempt, after all, aren't I?"

Aziraphale sighs and drops his eyes to the ground thinking that, sadly, all what Crowley's tempting mainly comes down to is making him indulge in way too much wine and sweets. Ridiculously enough, in their mutual six-thousand-year long history, the only incident of anything resembling true tempting actually happened the other way around.

"I'm not succumbing to your wiles, Serpent," the angel recites his customary response and gives Crowley a mild smile. For some reason, the demon prefers to ignore it altogether.

They have dinner at one of the best restaurants in Vienna, with Aziraphale dutifully stealing half of Crowley's Sacher cake, and then return back to the hotel where the demon keeps pestering him about dancing until he has no other option but to give in. After all, he does want to have Crowley's arms around him once more; does want to feel the other's presence in his comfort zone; does want the intimacy the dance provides. He wants it all desperately, and this is the sole reason why he keeps rejecting Crowley's offer. He knows it'll be like bothering an old wound, teasing himself with a mere taste of what it could be like but never will.

Yet he gives in, all the same. Aziraphale's not quite drunk but on his way to it, so he considers the idea of sobering up but rejects it almost immediately. He's not drunk enough to jeopardise his coordination but is just the right extent of tipsy to prevent him from taking things too seriously and start seeing more in the demon's offer than there really is. Crowley simply loves dancing, he's excellent at it and he's one stubborn bastard when he's set his mind to something, and the angel knows perfectly well that if his current desire is to teach him how to dance the bloody waltz, he's going to have a very hard time dissuading him.

So they end up positioned in the middle of the room, with the piano softly playing the Blue Danube in the background all by itself since it dares not disobey the demon's wish.

It's a strange feeling when his hand is taken ever so gently into Crowley's and when the demon's other one comes to rest lightly on his waist, and for a moment Aziraphale is robbed of his ability to breathe, with this proximity being suddenly too much for him to handle. But then the demon swirls him in a careful motion, and now the angel is astounded by another thing – by how surprisingly careful and delicate Crowley can be when he puts his mind to it, all smoothness instead of those nervous jerky motions, gentle and suave instead of sarcastic and sharp.

As they follow the sequence of steps, slowly for the angel to be able to memorise them properly, they're so close Aziraphale can feel warm puffs of Crowley's breaths on his face. The light is subdued around them, and in this semidarkness, everything seems to acquire a more intimate quality, and the angel isn't quite sure anymore that allowing this was one of his best decisions. After all, it reminds him way too much of that incident in the fifteenth century. All the same, this impromptu dancing lesson of theirs is still sweet in that poignant, sorrowful kind of way. Aziraphale does his best to follow Crowley without necessarily stepping on his toes, and after a certain while he finally gets the gist of it. It's odd how he can follow to the music when he sings and how oddly unnatural it feels to him to handle his body in accordance with the melody. But with the demon leading even the hopeless like him get a fair chance of mastering it at least to a fairly satisfactory level.

"See, told you it's not that complicated," Crowley murmurs, quickening the pace a little. His hushed tone adds to the intimacy of the dance itself, and it's all Aziraphale can do not to gulp.

They swirl, over and over again in the middle of the room until the angel masters the steps to perfection, following Crowley's lead, the demon's light, graceful steps complemented by his heavier and considerably less graceful ones. Crowley's a wonderful teacher, though, Aziraphale knows it from the days even before his Fall, so in the end, he's able to waltz around in the way which finally satisfies his companion.

After what seems to have been a couple of hours, they crash onto the sofa, more than a little out of breath, with cheeks flushed and hearts hammering, and they laugh. For a few moments, it seems to Aziraphale as if there's nothing in the world but the two of them, right here, cocooned in this soft gas light, and they are sharing something precious, something which is not obscured by years upon years of unvoiced confessions and pretentious claims, and nothing else either exists or matters. They sit there, side by side, Aziraphale's shoulder very close but not quite touching Crowley's, their heads thrown back against the headrest.

Very slowly, the angel turns his head to look at his counterpart. Crowley's eyes are closed and a smile is tugging at the corners of his lips. It's not his trademark flash bastard grin – it looks soft and contented, somehow more angelic than Aziraphale's own. Crowley's cheeks are flushed, and it suits him unforgivably well, the healthy colour of his skin a stark contrast against the jet-black of his hair. The collar of his shirt is undone, exposing a tempting sliver of bare skin of his throat and the ever-protruding collarbones. He does look like temptation incarnate, and he's got every right to be as he's basically the creator of it, but there's also something about the delicate, regular features of his face which  _almost_  makes it look innocent, especially now that there's that gentle, somehow brittle, smile on his lips.

Aziraphale allows himself a few moments of simply watching him, drinking in his beauty, taking pleasure in the mere act of witnessing him smile. His own blood is still high from the recent exercise, and it fills him with that invigorating sensation of lightness and delight, warmth and vitality. When his breathing comes back to its normal pattern, tough, the angel lightly pats Crowley's knee and vacates the sofa. He doesn't want to, not really, he'd stay right here if he could, but he knows it's not an option.

"Thank you, my dear," he says. "That's been absolutely delightful. You're an excellent teacher."

Crowley's eyes slip open, languidly, their amber colour accentuated by the soft light, and he gives Aziraphale a sated smile.

"Told you, you'd enjoy the whole thing. Wasn't all that complicated, was it?"

Aziraphale shakes his head, smiling, wondering if the demon's able to detect the wistfulness in it. "No, indeed it wasn't. Have a good night's sleep, dear boy."

He turns on his heels and heads for the door when Crowley's voice stops him in his tracks.

"Angel?" he calls after him quietly.

Aziraphale turns back to give him a questioning glance, against all common sense and his better judgement wishing, silently pleading Crowley to ask him to stay the night here, with him. He knows it's not going to happen; it did once and didn't end up particularly well, so he knows there won't be a repetition of that mistake anymore. But he still hopes, helplessly. Hoping is all he has left to do, isn't it?

"Yes?" he asks, and the short hesitation Crowley makes is excruciating.

"Thank you, too," the demon says at last, very softly. He's still smiling, and, if anything, it's  _his_ smile which looks rather wistful to Aziraphale.

"My pleasure," the angel nods and leaves quickly, before his feelings for Crowley get hold of him and make him do something both of them will regret later. They've been there before, after all.

***


	8. Chapter 8

**Crowley**

***

There's one thing which Crowley loathes more than anything else, more than the insufferable Dukes of Hell and their decidedly unfunny jokes, more than Hell interrupting yet another one of Queen's songs blasting from the Bentley's blaupunkt and talking to him in the voice of Freddy Mercury, more than the blessed Holy (which is already a curse in itself) Inquisition. That thing is not knowing something he thinks he should know. Ignorance makes one vulnerable, especially when one is a demon, and vulnerability is not a state Crowley likes to be in. In that case, not knowing things might result in an unwanted discorporation, at the very least, and lead to hellish tortures or something even more awful in the worst-case scenario.

The runner-up on his list of the most unacceptable phenomena is Hell's preferred method of communication, which he also hates with passion. He might be an infernal being, and his mind might be agile enough to deal with getting a chunk of information he had no clue about mere seconds before being dropped right into his head, but that does not necessarily imply that this is something he approves of. It feels like being mentally abused and subsequently left on your own to deal with the confusion such instantaneous knowledge normally causes. At best of times, it gives him a light case of vertigo. At worst, it might send him careening headfirst into the floor, which will be followed by nasty nausea and a motherfucker of a headache.

That's is why when at the Lower Tadfield airbase both of those loathsome things happen at the same time right in the very middle of the fucking Apocalypse – the realisation of his  _not knowing_  a hell of lot of things and the violent way of receiving the missing information – Crowley has a very hard time simply trying to stay upright. When the young Antichrist locks his fair blue eyes with Crowley's yellow ones, the demon feels short of breath because of a sudden influx of memories, memories which were lost ages ago. The sheer enormity of them and the weight that they carry in their wake is nigh on debilitating. Their eye contact can't last for more than a few seconds, half a dozen at most, but in the course of that very short stretch of time Crowley's entire existence seems to be turned inside out and then upside down and then stuffed back into his mind, without a single concern as to how he is going to handle it, how the hell he is going to  _live_ with it from now on.

The fact that he manages not to throw up, let alone stay on his feet and behave more or less the way he's expected to, is a miracle in itself. When Adam shifts his horrifying gaze to Aziraphale, who is still trapped in Madame Tracy's body, Crowley follows it with his own eyes but he has to avert them almost immediately for the angel suddenly materialises on the cracked tarmac of the airfield, looking a bit shaken and ruffled but ultimately the same he's always been. To his genuine horror, Crowley realises that he simply can't bear looking at Aziraphale anymore. With the knowledge and his memories back, those long lost, long gone, ancient memories he is not supposed to have in the first place, the idea of meeting the angel's gaze seems utterly petrifying. It's too much. How he manages to get through the rest of the Apocalypse and then subsequently be able to function adequately enough to drive them all back to London, is beyond Crowley. Must be the sheer shock of it all as his mind still hasn't coped with what has happened, inhumanly resilient as it is.

When they finally reach London, Crowley heads for Soho purely out of habit, having totally forgotten about the state of the bookshop, that it must have burnt to its very basement by now. He's so immersed into his troubled, jumbled thoughts that when Aziraphale puts a warm hand onto his forearm to prevent him from driving past it, he gives such a violent start that it makes the Jeep swerve. Crowley slams the brakes and comes to a standstill with a nasty screech of tires accurately across from the bookshop's front door, ignoring all possible parking regulations.

"Shit…" he breathes out a little shakily as he beholds the angel's home, in its legitimate place and perfectly unscathed, displaying absolutely no signs of having been burnt to the ground.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to give you a start," Aziraphale says apologetically, and Crowley feels his gaze on himself, questioning, prying, analysing.

Suddenly, the demon feels his skin crawl – the angel's hand is way too hot against his arm and his eyes are way too penetrating – and all he wants to do right now is get away, get away from Aziraphale as far as possible, get away from those scattered recollections of what once was and the terrifying knowledge of it all. But he can't tear his own eyes off the bookshop, all the same. Another memory, much more recent and vivid than those old-time disturbing other ones, resurfaces in his mind, that of the bookshop disappearing in flames, and his own horror at the face of the fact that Aziraphale must be there inside. What Crowley feels like doing is shriek, at the top of his lungs, shriek until his throat goes sore and his ears go deaf, because if he doesn't, he's certain he's going to explode. The bloody Apocalypse, the prospects of Aziraphale being discorporated in flames and subsequently recalled to Heaven right on the threshold of the end of the world, the fact of what he dared to do to Ligur, Hell's threats, the way the young Antichrist violated his mind, dropping all that six-thousand-year-old worth of knowledge into his head, Lucifer nearly manifesting himself at the Lower Tadfield airbase, and now  _this_ , this restored bookshop, as good as new, exactly where it is supposed to be. Crowley's never given such possibility a thought, but he suspects he might be on the verge of going insane.

_You're going slightly mad_ , Mercury's voice sing-songs in his head, and Crowley has to pull himself together to prevent a scream.

And then, as if all of it wasn't enough to drive him to the brink of a serious mental breakdown, there are also feelings he's growing more aware of by the minute, simultaneously novel and awfully familiar feelings, terrifying feelings, feelings which any demon with an ounce of self-respect shouldn't be able to even entertain the slightest notion of, let alone experience. But venturing into that territory definitely promises him nothing but insanity, so Crowley shuts them off by sheer force of will, which after that serious exercise of holding the burning Bentley together feels more than slightly worse for wear.

"So he's restored it all today," he mutters under his breath, stunned.

His lips refuse to cooperate properly, and perhaps that's for the better, otherwise he might be able to string words together and thus would probably have to somehow explain to Aziraphale what he means. As it is, what leaves his mouth is a hardly articulate murmur.

"My dear?" the angel asks, and his impossibly soft hand tightens on Crowley's forearm impossibly gently. They've been there before, haven't they, all this gentleness be damned. "Are you quite all--"

"Yes," Crowley blurts. "Yes, I am. I--"

"Crowley?"

"Go ahead, angel," he urges, his lips still refusing to shape words normally. He doesn't look at Aziraphale. He's terrified; really, properly terrified now, everything catching up with him like some delayed backlash. "Go check your bookshop and--"

"I was going to offer you to come in, too," the angel says slowly, sounding a bit taken aback and quite a lot more than a bit disappointed. "I thought we both might need a drink after everything that's just happened. Would you mind?"

Crowley feels another fit of vertigo hitting him. It's only barely that he can hold back a groan, but he manages. Instead, he only shakes his head, which intensifies the nausea.

"No, I mean, yes… I… ah… have some matters to… to settle," he stutters, so unlike his normally smooth and suave manner of speech. "Urgent ones."

"Oh… All right…" the angel says slowly, and the obvious chagrin in his voice makes Crowley even sicker than he already is.   
  
_So it must be real, all of it, what with all those bloody memories_ , the demon thinks desperately.  _Ever since the blasted dawn of times, Aziraphale--_  
  
Aziraphale's hand gives Crowley's forearm another careful squeeze, and the demon feels his thumb run softly over his skin before the angel finally lets go. 

_Oh someone help him, how can this blasted angel be doing this, doing this to_ him _, of all people, shamelessly tempting the Original Tempter, and not bloody Fall for it?_  
  
"Give me a call if… if you need anything, will you?" Aziraphale sounds so hopeful saying that, so blatantly  _open_ , that Crowley wonders despite himself how he's been able to purposefully ignore the underlying implication ever since that incident in the fifteenth century, and then he wonders how on earth he could have failed to notice it altogether before that. The raw emotion in Aziraphale's voice, the sheer intensity of his love, makes him grit his teeth.

"Yeah, sure," he promises automatically, fighting off the oncoming sickness the best he can. His head isn't just aching, it's practically killing him now, threatening to split in two. He still refuses to look at the angel, but he feels his counterpart's startled, questioning eyes on himself.

_Damn you, angel_ , he swears under his breath.  _Damn you from this Apocalypse that wasn't to the very kingdom come._

Then Aziraphale suppresses a sigh, doing a rather lousy job out of it, admittedly, and gets out. Crowley drives away without giving him a single glance, tires screeching against the pavement one more time. Once he's a safe distance away from the bookshop, he stops the car again, flings the door open, leans out and vomits.

He's not sure he's ever felt worse than this in all the thousands of years of his demonic existence, with the exception of the Fall, perhaps. The Fall, after all, wasn't quite a stroll Downwards, no matter how much he likes to present it that way. He wipes his mouth with a violently trembling hand and sits like that for a while, gasping for breath, his fingers tugging at his mussed sooty hair. Somewhere at the very back of his mind, there is a nagging thought, a desire of sorts, to make a U-turn and drive back to the bookshop, find Aziraphale and tell him everything, beg him for relief, plead him to soothe and take away this awful confusion that seems to be smothering him, pray him to lull him into oblivious sleep like he's done many times before, but Crowley knows better than that. The angel is the last person in the world he wants to go to, right now perhaps more terrifying than all the Dukes of Hell rolled in one.

After a while, when the fit of sickness seems to have subsided a little, Crowley slams the door shut and resumes his journey back to Mayfair. He needs to come to terms with everything he knows now, for starters, and he needs to do it on his own. Aziraphale's presence would only complicate things even further, and they're already complicated enough as they are. 

The first thing he encounters upon arriving is the Bentley, big as life, standing right at the entrance of his block of flats, looking flawless, gleaming and giving the impression of being loved and cared for. It should give him immense relief but Crowley barely spares it a glance, only at the back of his mind registering its utterly improbable presence. Instead, he tiredly negotiates the stairs heading for his front door. When he unlocks it with a wave of his hand, it becomes obvious that the place is in its immaculately clean state, no damage from before the Apocalypse detectable anywhere. As he suspected, the carpet in his office bears no remains of Ligur on it. The Antichrist must have repaired it all, it seems. Crowley wonders whether he saved a few whales while he was at it since he was ranting about them back there in Tadfield, and the thought nearly makes him let out an irate giggle. Nearly. He would have if he weren't feeling so utterly out of his element, as if having been disassembled into separate atoms and then jammed back together but not exactly in the same way he used to be.

Aziraphale, in fact, was right about one thing – that they both needed a drink. Hell yes, Crowley does need a drink, preferably big enough to knock him out right away and make him remain in that state for perhaps a few hundred years. After all that's happened over these past twenty four hours – their discovery that who they thought to be the Antichrist wasn't the Antichrist at all, Ligur's last terminal bath in Holy Water, Hastur chasing him through the telephone cable, that nerve-wrecking journey to Tadfield in his blazing Bentley, the not quite Apocalypse with the Metatron and Beelzebub and then Satan nearly manifesting himself on Earth and his subsequent memory restoration – after all that Crowley feels his nerves are so frazzled that perhaps even another six thousand years of sleep wouldn't make up for it all. But he knows he can't afford that, he knows the angel will be upon him soon enough no matter where he hides – because Aziraphale is enough of a bastard to do this, has been enough of a bastard for all those six thousand years to have the guts to be doing  _this_  to him – and by the moment he comes, Crowley needs to have it all sorted out.  
  
The task seems complicated enough right from the start, but as hours go by with him sitting on the sofa, staring at the turned off TV and trying to wrap his head around it all, trying to come to terms with having that multitude of memories back in his possession, he's beginning to feel like he's drowning. Drowning in a bottomless sea of confusion with no safety jacket on or a flotation ring to rescue him. There seems to be no end to the memories he has been given back, they keep floating up in his mind like bubbles, resurfacing here and there, totally disjointed but vivid, so awfully vivid Crowley wants to squeeze his head in his hands and scream until he passes out.  
  
The irony of it all is that he's never actually lied to Aziraphale. Well, no, of course, he has, on plenty of occasions; as a matter of fact, their friendship began with his lying back there in the Garden, but none of those lies concerned anything which really mattered. Until a few hours ago, he'd indeed had no recollections of Heaven and his life in Heaven whatsoever, not a single trace of it left in his memory after his Fall. Chronologically, the first thing Crowley was able to recall was the Fall itself, and that's not something he's ever been particularly keen on remembering. His first memory of Aziraphale was that from the Eastern Gate of Eden, sitting on his butt in the ankle-deep lush grass and weeping his eyes out, his sword, not flaming at that moment, leaned against one of the gateposts.

In one of his curiosity fits – and they've always been somehow cautious, almost reluctant curiosity fits – Aziraphale asked him if he could remember the Fall. Crowley smirked humourlessly and told him, truthfully enough, that yes, indeed, he could, mainly for the reason that it had been way too painful to forget. That, apparently, satisfied the angel's curiosity as he apologised for bringing up the topic and has never raised it ever since, to Crowley's genuine relief. Thinking about it was like living through it again, with all the excruciating torment of it, wings burnt, the connection with Him severed, that sucking sensation as His grace left him, and the worst of it all was that he didn't remember why exactly he'd Fallen in the first place. He told Aziraphale the truth when he said that the only thing the Fallen knew was that they felt on some intrinsic level that their descent to Hell was meant to happen, and Crowley had no reason to doubt it.   
  
He never lied to Aziraphale about love, either. Not until the blasted fifteenth century with its Spanish Inquisition, in any case. Until then, he was indeed certain that such phenomenon as love did not exist, at least among humans. Demons were deprived of it, and that was okay, angels were obligated to feel it due to their nature, which was obvious, and humans simply lusted after things and acted out of sheer convenience. Aziraphale claimed it wasn't so, that there were plenty of examples to prove Crowley's idea of their originally flawed souls wrong, but every time Crowley said he could see no love whatsoever in what they did, he told the truth. Perhaps because there really was no love, perhaps because as a result of his demonic nature, he simply couldn't perceive it, but the fact remained the same – he did not lie to the angel.   
  
And then the fifteenth century came, bringing the Holy Inquisition in its wake and what they did back then in Spain and--  
  
\--and this is the first time since that incident that Crowley's found enough courage to acknowledge its occurrence in their mutual history. The thought actually makes him chuckle, a little hysterically, because courage is not the right word for it – he's never been more terrified in his entire existence.  
  
If Crowley's quite honest with himself – which he doesn't always like to be – he's known it ever since the time Aziraphale slept with him, known that the angel has been right about love all along. Defending the mere notion of its existence, he wasn't only talking about humans' ability to feel or express it, of course not, and now Crowley understands why that was. He was defending his own right to feel that blasted love, wasn't he? Arguing with Crowley till he was blue in the face, trying to convince him that love had a place to be, he was just trying to… to do what? Did Aziraphale think that if he managed to make him believe it really did exist, Crowley, despite being a demon, would somehow be able to feel it, too? Even return it?

_Soulmates_ , Aziraphale called them, those they loved back in Heaven.  _Most angels had soulmates_ , he said.

Of course, they did.

Crowley sort of liked the angel right from the beginning – well, what he used to think of as the Beginning, anyway, meaning the Garden – but he mainly attributed this impression of being birds of a feather to the fact that Aziraphale was just another occult being on this planet. Now, though, he wonders if he was somehow  _sensing_  someone familiar albeit not being able to remember him. After all, it turns out Aziraphale  _was_  someone familiar, blessit, the two of them had been those bloody _soulmates_ back in Heaven.

Whatever it was that played its part in their story, they did become friends, close enough to trust each other with their very lives, close enough to seek each other's company for the sake of company, close enough to be able to fall asleep in each other's presence, close enough for Aziraphale to actually be enough of a bastard to fill Crowley's share of wiling around if the circumstances demanded it, close enough for Crowley to cover up for the angel in return. Crowley refuted love, but he never said anything against this mutual convenience which the angel called friendship.   
  
Thanks to this improbable friendship, they came up with the Arrangement that gave terms and conditions to it, which Crowley liked even more. It was business relationship, clear and transparent enough, which was extremely convenient for someone who was sick and tired of Hell's spiderweb of plots and intrigues. The Arrangement strictly prohibited either of them to use their tricks on each other, which was perfectly fine with him. Crowley never had any desire to tempt Aziraphale for real anyway, and the thought of making him Fall never even so much as crossed his mind. There was nothing in their Arrangement which prohibited Aziraphale to tempt and Crowley to love, though, mainly because both notions seemed utterly counter-intuitive. Angels didn't tempt anyone, and demons weren't able to love.

And then, ironically, the fifteenth century happened, as if a great cosmic joke making them both look like the world's biggest idiots.

Crowley has always been able recall everything which happened then vividly enough without the Antichrist's help, it's just that he's forbidden himself to do it up until now. The problem was, it wasn't all about sex, or rather, it wasn't about sex  _at all_. The sex they had was awesome, and if it had only been about the purely physical part of it, Crowley wouldn't have minded. The angel didn't Fall, who knew for whatever reason – at least, that's what Crowley told himself, unwilling to acknowledge the only reason there could be to allow for it – which meant no harm done. If it'd been only about sex, Crowley wouldn't have minded to repeat the entire thing. Lust, after all, was in his job description, and he was good at it. The noises Aziraphale made that night proved he was good at it, not that he really needed any confirmation. The problem was, it wasn't lust. 

Crowley draws his hand across his eyes, shaking, sweaty but cold, thinking of it for the first time since the fifteenth century, thinking consciously of what took place then, finally allowing his mind drift all the way back but not sure what kind of reaction it’ll provoke. Terror, certainly. Terror at how stupidly he was captured, terror at how he wasn’t able to free himself no matter what he tried to do, terror at the dawning realization of what he’d stupidly put himself at risk of and at what was going to happen next. The pain, too. And then… there was more pain but--

Crowley pulls in a laborious quivering inhale and gulps down another mouthful of good ole whiskey.  _Shit_.

_\--warmth. Warmth everywhere. Those last tendrils of excruciating pain draining away from his body, leaving only exhaustion and dull ache in their wake, both of which are almost welcome. The feeling of being able to breathe properly at last, for the first time in who knew how long. Crowley pulled in a trial breath, shallow, but he didn’t really need much more, that was more than enough to be able to catch the whiff of that familiar radiance, so full of warmth, warm scent of sunshine and tea and old dry wood. Warmth everywhere. Warmth enveloping him from head to toe, soothing his sore skin, fighting the coldness that had settled deep in his bones, banishing it away; his body absorbing it readily, willingly, hungrily. Not heat, not the scorching kind, not like Holy Water on his skin, burning so hot he’d screamed, no, none of that, just warmth, gentle, persistent, soothing warmth, and it had a name, his angel's name, Aziraphale’s name._

_Crowley let it be, just like that, not struggling against it as he’d sometimes – often – done, but not responding to it either because he had no strength left in him for it anyway, so he just let go, allowing that warm glow coming from behind his closed eyelids wrap around him, cling to his skin, get underneath it, warm his blood, his cold blood of a reptile flowing in his human body that was made alive by his demonic essence which once used to be… used to be different. Used to be light and warm, just like Aziraphale’s._

_Caught in this weird slumber, bone-tired, still aching from the residue of the angel’s healing powers, which wasn't as bad as the Holy Water but still hurt like a bitch, Crowley wondered who the hell he was at all. He understood on some innate level of his being that it wasn’t a question a decent demon should be asking himself, a question which had no answer anyway for he had forgotten it all and wouldn’t ever be allowed to remember, but still unable to help it, still wondering deep inside his head just what the hell he was, what the hell he had been for nigh on six millennia, sneaking around with an angel, allowing this angel to come close, all too close, allowing him to become a friend, and now allowing_ this  _to happen, this warmth, all over him, warmth clenching his throat, warmth soothing his pains and aches, warmth gentle as the evening sun just before it sat on a hottest summer day, warmth making its way inside, deeper, to his very core, doing something there, warming, thawing his very essence._

_He’d fight if he could, he’d run like he’d done on many an occasion before, away from it for it was too much for the likes of him to experience, but Crowley couldn’t run. He was trapped there by this warmth as well as by his lack of strength, helpless, who knew where – well, Aziraphale surely did know where – lying half-curled on his side with his aching wings outstretched behind him, unable to move his eyelids let alone a single limb of his body, but wrapped into this warmth, better than that provided by nice clothing, better than that of a thick down duvet, better than sunshine. A pure taste of Heaven._

_Unsticking his eyelids took a hell of an effort, but Crowley had to, had to do it because he needed to see he wasn’t hallucinating, dreaming it all while still hanging from the ropes in that dank smelly dungeon in… where had it been, anyway? It seemed he couldn’t recall, it was too tiring to try to organize thoughts inside his head, better just give in and feel it, even if it were nothing but a hallucination… yet he had to know. With an effort of will, Crowley did open his eyes, letting them slip shut a fraction of a second later as the light was way too bright, but then he forced them open again. It was better this time, not by a long shot but better all the same, enough to see all he needed to see – the only other being he trusted to be around him while he was like this, helpless and vulnerable. Aziraphale wasn’t looking at him, he was looking down, seemingly about to leave._

_The bolt of terror piercing through Crowley was so strong it gave him enough strength to lift his hand and grab for the angel’s wrist; it seemed like he'd do anything to keep the angel where he was, with that blasted warmth of his, that unbearable radiance he exuded. The motion about knocked him out again, nausea swirling his head around, so Crowley pinched his eyes shut again but didn’t let go, hand clamped on Aziraphale's with the last ounces of strength. Aziraphale’s skin was warm against his fingertips. He didn’t want to let go, couldn’t let go._

_The next time he managed to open his eyes again, those cerulean blue ones met his, clear as they’d ever been but troubled. Fuck, but Crowley could barely drag in a breath now, something clenching his throat and clenching his chest, painfully, oh so painfully, but in a different kind of pain, not the one from his injuries, and not the kind from the angel’s healing powers, but the kind of it which filled him from the inside, threatening to overflow, swelling, too much of it for him to be able to contain._

_He said something to Aziraphale then, fighting that lump in his throat, and Aziraphale said something to him, something he wouldn’t be able to remember later so perhaps it wasn’t all that important. What was important was that, after a while, it was Aziraphale’s palm sliding against his own, warm, soft, dry, holding his hand securely, thumb drawing featherlight caresses on his skin. The last thing Crowley thought before falling into the abyss of dreamless sleep, dark and syrupy, was that they had the Arrangement so it was okay, okay to give in, okay to let Aziraphale do whatever he thought was needed to be done, okay for him to rest because they were partners in this great cosmic crime they were committing, weren't they?_

_The next time he came to, it was pitch dark all around, for which Crowley was grateful. It meant he didn’t get his eyes stabbed the moment he opened them, and that was good because the process of opening them still required considerable effort. There still was pain, much less of it, though, only the residue more like tiredness pinning him down to the floor as if his limbs weighed like stones. Slowly, taking his time, Crowley let his gaze focus on what was before him, taking it in. He should be surprised, but he wasn’t, perhaps still being too weak for any sort of strong emotion to awaken in him. There was a cloud of curls which could only belong to one being in the universe. Framed by them, Aziraphale’s face was relaxed, not a single line marking it anywhere, no frown on his brow, no wrinkles running down from the sides of his nose to the corners of his mouth. Those full lips were parted just a tiny bit, the angel's even breath wheezing past them._

_Crowley let his gaze glide over his companion's features, slowly, drowsily._ Angel’s sleep, huh _, he thought to himself, barely conscious he was doing it. There was a good distance left between them, which was all right with Crowley because he could feel that warmth anyway. He’d be able to feel it if the angel was in the other end of the room, let alone like this. One of his hands was warm, too, resting on the pillow between them. Crowley reckoned it was warm because Aziraphale’s was still wrapped around it. He closed his eyes again._

_Sometime during the night – or perhaps it was another night, he wasn’t quite sure – he woke up again, a little more aware this time of Aziraphale still sleeping like he had beside him. If he didn’t find him here now, he’d think that he must have dreamt it all, but the angel was there so it had to be real, unless he was dreaming waking up. That was way too much for Crowley's weary mind to contemplate and comprehend, so he let his eyelids slip shut once more. He didn't fall asleep immediately, though. Instead, he remained like that for a while, taking his time to just breathe, to acknowledge the presence of the angel here with him, in such proximity, in this closed space wherever they were, to soak in the warmth of his corporeal body and that of his celestial essence. Warily, Crowley made inspection of his own form, too, shifting his attention from limb to limb, assessing the damage or registering the lack thereof. He still hurt but nowhere near like he used to, merely a residual ache, tiredness so deep it seems to reside in his very bones. Otherwise, he seemed to have survived._

_And that was the sole courtesy of one being._

_Slowly, Crowley opened his eyes again to take a look at the one without whose assistance and help he'd have been dead long ago, in torments most certainly, but instead thanks to whom he was lying here, safe and sound, wrapped into warmth from head to toe, his wings healed and the Holy Water burns but scars on his wrists and arms. He looked at Aziraphale, spent a whole while doing just that, letting his gaze rest on those fluffy curls, studying the features he'd come to know almost intimately well, every single curve and line. Then Crowley breathed again, deeply, taking in a whole lungful of the only scent he'd ever cared to associate with anything relatively close to safety, and let his eyelids slip shut again. On the verge of drifting off into oblivion – it was easier now because he didn't have to analyse any of what he was doing, he could barely think at all – Crowley shifted over the bedding, scooting closer to Aziraphale and that ubiquitous warmth. It required a real effort from him even though the movement was barely there._

_He ended up with his face not quite nuzzling the angel's chest. The sheer living heat of Aziraphale's body would have probably knocked him down weren't he already lying on the floor, so real and tangible Crowley had to screw his eyes tight against the fit of another kind of warmth, this one unfurling somewhere deep inside of him, as if the angel's radiance had somehow managed to finally find its way inside his body._

_Crowley bit his lip, refusing to think about any of it, refusing to acknowledge what he was doing. It was easier to simply do, lie there snuggled close to Aziraphale, taking solace in his presence, than analyse anything. In a while, Crowley experimentally shifted his wing, and even though the joints and ligaments felt stiff as if from disuse, it seemed to work the way it should, at least as far as merely moving it was concerned. Swallowing hard, Crowley shifted it all the way until it was resting over them both, shielding them from the night's chill. It was the least he could to for the angel after what the angel had done for him, right? Crowley asked himself, refusing to answer his own question. Could leastwise keep them both warm, knowing perfectly well that it was Aziraphale keeping them both warm, what with that angelic glow of his._

_Crowley closed his eyes against it all, concentrating on breathing and on breathing only._

_Sometime in the course of that night – or maybe the next night – Crowley's arm snaked its way to the angel's waist, ever so timidly, closer, closer to that intoxicating warmth which seemed to find its way through his very veins now that there was real, physical contact between them to his very heart of hearts. Crowley pulled in a shuddering breath and let sleep wash over him again._

_The next time the demon woke up was because there was something, something in that outer world filled with Aziraphale's radiance, something that… Crowley gave it a thought – tried to, anyway, because it seemed his head was filled with something fuzzy which refused to cooperate and take thinking seriously – and after a while understood that it was not just something, it was Aziraphale's warm palm coming to rest ever so lightly on his side. The demon's eyes shot open wide, peering right at the angel's face mere inches away from his own. He didn't know what he expected to see but it turned out that Aziraphale's own eyes were still closed, face relaxed, that drowsy serenity hanging over him. Crowley's next realization was that it wasn't only that Aziraphale's hand was holding him, it was that the said hand was actually in direct contact with his skin because Crowley wasn't wearing anything at all and those blankets he was wrapped in had been pushed to pool just below his waist._

_Aziraphale's hand. On him. On his very skin. So light and so heavy at the same time. So desperately wanted and so mind-numbingly terrifying._

_What the blessed something did the angel think he was doing? What did he think he was doing, being there, so close to Crowley, sleeping there beside him, touching him like this? What was Crowley doing there, for that matter, naked as he was, snuggled close to the angel and with his wing wrapped protectively around him? What were they doing sleeping together? Crowley swallowed hard, knowing he should get the hell out of there, knowing he should conjure up some decent clothing and hit the road, wherever that road might lead, preferably before the angel woke up and made this already awkward situation entirely outrageous._

_Except it wasn't all that awkward, was it? No, it wasn't awkward at all. If anything, being there with Aziraphale, so close, feeling his skin with his own skin and having his wing sheltering the angel, feeling his breaths on his own face and that unnerving, wonderful warmth radiating off him, all of those things, together, felt awfully right. Crowley blinked lazily, letting his gaze settle on the angel's face again, now more awake than he'd been since the moment he had been captured, but apparently not awake and sensible enough to stop_ this _from happening. Without much effort, he shut off whatever thoughts his mind might have on the situation and simply let himself go with the flow. And anyway, there wasn't happening much, was it? While Aziraphale was still sleeping – and wasn't that already something outstanding, the angel not being vigilant for once – he could indulge in something he'd never allow himself to do otherwise, under any other circumstances – he could watch the angel to his heart's content, this close and personal, enjoying the warmth, letting it wrap around him, letting it penetrate inside of him, too, because, what the hell, it did feel good, there was no point in denying it and Crowley didn't have enough strength to even try to anyway._

_And then, at some point, Aziraphale wasn't asleep anymore, his eyes – still blue but way darker without any light source around – staring right at Crowley, unblinking, and there was so much to read into this long stare, so much lurking in those bottomless depths. Maybe someone could have possibly misunderstood this look in the angel's eyes, misinterpret it somehow, taking it for caring or worry or celestial kindness, but Crowley had been a demon for way too long to confuse the emotion he saw with anything else._

_Oh blessed something, here was Aziraphale, an angel to the bone, a former Principality, Guardian of the Eastern Gate, Heaven's own representative here on this green and blue planet, enough of a bastard in Crowley's eyes to be likable; here he was, his face mere inches away from Crowley's, his soft hand on Crowley's bare side, so much blessed gentleness in the touch it was robbing Crowley of his breathing ability; here he was, with his eyes full of unguarded, intense longing, nothing like he'd ever seen on the angel's face before._

_Or had he? Why on earth wasn't he surprised then, shocked out of his skin seeing the pure desire in Aziraphale's eyes? Crowley swallowed, tried to be surprised. Tried to be scandalised. Tried to be angry. And wasn't._

_Instead, what he felt in response was a surge of yearning that matched the one in Aziraphale's eyes, a surge so strong he wanted to groan but couldn't, a surge starting way down deep, it seemed in the very centre of his being, and spreading through him, to the very tips of his fingers and toes, heat kindling in his gut and engulfing his entire self. Looking at Aziraphale now, seeing the longing in his eyes, in their dark stormy blue, watching his full parted lips, wanting them on his own, wanting to feel the pressure of them, Crowley wanted only one thing – to know just how soft angelic lips were. He had no right to feel things like this to an angel, to this angel in particular, but, oh boy, he did. Crowley shifted his eyes to those plump reddish lips, tempting, oh someone help him, how could an angel have such a seductive mouth, huh, and then back to Aziraphale's eyes, and then he was stunned out of his mind because that blasted insufferable angel, that irritating, righteous angel, that magnificent beautiful angel was moving towards him, eyelids slipping shut, and the next moment Crowley knew what it was like to have an angel's lips on his own._

_Light, and tingling, and terrifying all at the same time, disarming, and warm, and, oh yes, they were soft, those lips, so soft on his own, so awfully gentle, so unbearably caring, so loving… Crowley pinched his eyes shut, forbidding himself to think about anything like that, to feel anything like that, he couldn't, he wasn't allowed to, he was a demon, goddamn it all, he—_

_And then Aziraphale's lips moved against his, just a tiny motion, pressing a bit more firmly, and, suddenly, Crowley was falling, shit, he was tumbling down into territories unknown, and for someone's sake, hadn't he already Fallen once, huh? Why should it be happening to him again, happening like this, with Aziraphale doing this to him, tipping him over the edge with one gentle push, and here he was plunging into the abyss—_

_And then there was Aziraphale's breath on his face, hitched and unsteady, and Crowley found himself unable not to kiss him back, with just as much tenderness he didn't know he had in him, responding to the enticing motion of that mouth, unable to pull back despite knowing better, despite knowing he shouldn't be doing this, despite knowing he had no business making out with an angel, not with Aziraphale, not here, blast it, they were in some holy place, and he was going to be incinerated by the sheer ethereal radiance if he kept doing this, Aziraphale was going to suffer dire consequences, too—_

_And then the angel's hand tightened its hold on his side, fingers digging into his flesh, and Crowley couldn't help but gasp, right into Aziraphale's parted lips, opening his mouth just a tad wider, now able to feel the moisture on his own lips. The kiss they were sharing was still fairly chaste, no tongue involved, but Aziraphale seemed needy, desperate somehow, something an angel shouldn't be, no, shouldn't be doing this, and Crowley wondered why he didn't feel any pain of it, why it felt so bloody delightful to be kissing Aziraphale, to give in, to let him lead him into something that certainly wasn't allowed by either side—_

_And then Aziraphale pressed himself into Crowley's naked body, pressed himself firmly, and, just like that, Crowley was doomed. Or, perhaps, the angel was doomed. Or maybe both of them were._

_Because, right against his thigh, through the layers of the blankets he was still wrapped into and through the fabric of the angel's garments, Crowley could feel the unequivocal hardness; there was no mistaking it, Aziraphale's hard flesh pressed against his leg. The angel actually gasped into his half-open mouth at the moment of impact, and yes, Crowley was completely gone because a demon of this world could only stand this much._

_What the blasted hell are you doing to me? he wanted to yell. Why the fuck are you doing this? Why are you like this?_

_But he didn't._

_He was a demon, Temptation creator, and a man-shaped being of this world, and, yes, he wanted this, too, just as much as Aziraphale apparently did, for whatever reason. So instead of pulling back, or pushing Aziraphale away, or asking anything, Crowley simply opened his mouth wider and then pushed – almost forced – his tongue in between the angel's unresisting lips. It was the end of them, he knew it for sure when Aziraphale actually started sucking on his tongue. This wasn't supposed to be happening, Aziraphale wasn't supposed to be allowing this to happen, Crowley wasn't supposed to be craving this so much, either. But he was, and the scariest thing was that… there was something, something else, something different. Despite what he was doing to Aziraphale, now demon full mode for sure, despite his wicked tongue doing wicked things in the angel's mouth, despite his lithe body pressing into Aziraphale's, pushing his own hardness against the angel's leg, despite his hunger, there still was something Aziraphale was bringing into this, too, something light and delicate and—_

_Crowley choked when, suddenly, there was Aziraphale's skin against his, hot, the sensation of the angel's body – softer round the edges, firm muscles rolling underneath that silken angelic skin – almost suffocating, and then Crowley was rolling them both on the floor, gripping Aziraphale firmly and pulling him on top of himself, because… because… oh fuck, just because he wanted it to be like this, and then there it was, Aziraphale's arms around him, Aziraphale's tongue in his mouth, Aziraphale's breath on his face, and Aziraphale's cock, hot and throbbing, pressed alongside his own, and he thought he was dying, right there, held in the angel's arms where he had absolutely no right to be, dying and probably pulling Aziraphale after himself._

_Even so, he couldn't stop, no chance in Heaven or Hell or on this blasted green earth, no matter how terrified he was by what Aziraphale was radiating, no matter how terrified he was that he'd most certainly be obliterated in the process because he had no right to be feeling what Aziraphale wanted him to feel, no matter how terrified he was of dragging the angel after himself, making him angel no more…_

_He wasn't taking any part in this. No, of course, he was, but he wasn't going to be the one initiating it all, no, not for the life of him. If the blasted angel had an intention to Fall, Crowley wasn't helping him any, wasn't giving him that final nudge. Still having Aziraphale's tongue in his mouth, deep and twisting – and fuck, wasn't he learning the tricks fast – Crowley spread his legs and then wrapped them around Aziraphale's hips. He wasn't going to stop this, he couldn't stop this, but perhaps he could offer the angel a chance to stop. Surely, Aziraphale wouldn't stoop so low as to fuck a demon, huh?_

_Yet Aziraphale apparently wasn't going to take the given chance, the blasted fool, because… shit, he knew what he was doing, wasn't he? Knew what he was doing when he slipped one of his arms around Crowley's waist, thus urging him to lift his hips – and Crowley obeyed; knew what he was doing when he simultaneously lifted one of Crowley's legs, hand gripping him under his knee – and Crowley followed his lead and on the angel's shoulder it went; knew what he was doing when he pressed the tip of his cock where Crowley wanted it most of all, and fuck, yes he did, yes he wanted Aziraphale, an angel, to fuck him, wanted it like nothing else he'd ever wanted in this world._

_And fucked he did get, but there was more to it than lust. Lust, he knew deep inside himself, belonged solely to him. Aziraphale was giving him something else, something magnificent, something Crowley struggled not to acknowledge but couldn't help feeling, in every single kiss of the angel's lips, in every single sound Aziraphale emitted, in every single touch of his soft hands, in every single thrust of his hips. He felt huge and hot inside him, and Crowley felt like he was thawing from the inside because, while he was fucking Crowley, Aziraphale's eyes never left his, blazing blue, dazzling, loving._

_Crowley heard a scream, long and shaky, only belatedly realising it had been ripped out of his own throat when he came, but, fuck, he didn't care anymore, couldn't care even if the entire hosts of Heaven and Hell were present here, because this was… this was… he couldn't speak, he couldn't breathe, and he couldn't let go of Aziraphale, the best feeling in this entire world to be snuggled so close to the angel that he didn't know anymore where he ended and Aziraphale began, to be held in that angelic embrace, bathed in warmth and care and… Crowley choked, feeling a shudder run through his entire frame, knowing it was all wrong but unable to resist it all the same, unable to move away, waiting for something of global proportion to happen, something disastrous, himself being obliterated by the sheer magnitude of the angel's love or smitten by some other angel coming after him for what he'd done to Aziraphale, or worst of all, waiting for Aziraphale to Fall from Grace as a punishment for what they'd just committed. But nothing like that happened, and, eventually, Crowley drifted off into a peaceful exhausted sleep._

 

Aziraphale didn't Fall back then, and there could only be one explanation for it, one which Crowley has been trying to purposefully ignore these past several centuries. He didn't even need to come to any logical conclusions – he  _felt_ it back then. He felt Aziraphale's love, pure, irresistible and utterly terrifying. He could feel it in every kiss they shared, in every single caress of the angel's soft hands on his bruised body, he could feel it in the warm waves of affection that were literally radiating off Aziraphale, he could see it in his stunning shining cerulean eyes as they--  
  
\-- _made love,_ Crowley's inner voice says,  _this is what you did._

And the problem was, indeed they did. And Crowley enjoyed every single moment of it, too, despite the terror it evoked deep inside his very core. He enjoyed it from start to finish, from the moment he felt that uncertain press of the angel's plump lips against his to the moment when he lay sprawled half on top of Aziraphale, spent and more exhausted than he'd ever felt in his life, completely overwhelmed but somehow inexplicably contented at the same time, feeling the heat of the angel's skin against his own with every inch of his body. He was literally bathed in Aziraphale's love but, against all odds, it didn't incinerate him alive. It should have, but it didn't. What was worse, it felt good. What was even more awful, it was invoking something in him, too, something Crowley was not prepared to face let alone deal with, something he's still not quite able to handle, either, but it seems he doesn't have a bloody choice in the matter anymore, thanks to the Antichrist's World Repair Policy whereby he was given back those long-lost memories he never asked for in the first place. 

_We had soulmates_ , Aziraphale told him over that jug of wine they were sharing in one of the taverns in Jerusalem on the night of Christ's crucifixion, that strange, distant sorrow in his eyes. Well, damn, that explains well enough why Crowley had to feel those confusing things awakening somewhere deep inside of his being; it makes it clear why he's always been drawn to the angel, from that first day they met at the Eastern Gate of Eden. Back then, Crowley justified it by convenience, but it wasn't convenience. It makes it clear why he's always felt soothed in the angel's presence; it makes it clear why he's never even considered the possibility of tricking Aziraphale into Falling from Grace. How could he, really?

_They_  were soulmates, back there in Heaven.  
  
Crowley understands it all on some rational, logical level; it even does make some sort of weird sense now that he has got those jumbled memories to refer to, but it does nothing in terms of improving his completely messed up emotional state. It seems beyond his ability to comprehend and accept as there are way too many way too different memories of himself, recollections of all that's taken place ever since his Fall and at the same time those of another version of him, one who wasn't terrified of loving Aziraphale or of being loved in return, and those two chunks of memories do not go well together. It's like he's lived two totally different lives – which is, in some sense, exactly what he has done – and these two totally different experiences are now threatening to drive him insane.  
  
And then, as Crowley walks back down the memory lane, back to the true Beginning, one which he forgot long ago, just to return all the way back to the present moment again, he realises – and isn't it funny just how  _unexpected_  this realisation is – that Aziraphale must have known about who he was and who he had been all along.

Crowley remembers that stunned look in the angel's eyes during their very first encounter on Earth. Aziraphale didn't even attempt to protect himself when Crowley attacked him, which he couldn't wrap his head around with them being two agents of the opposing sides, and Crowley thinks he's finally found the explanation. Of course, Aziraphale didn't fight back. He knew who Crowley was, after all. It seems oh so obvious now.

He remembers Gomorrah's doomsday, the cold blade of Aziraphale's dagger piercing his chest thus quickly and effectively discorporating him. Aziraphale told him he did it to protect him from the host of Heaven camping in the city which was about to be destroyed, and Crowley once again believed him, but it's only now that he understands the underlying motive as to why the angel even bothered. He remembers the touch of Aziraphale's hand on his as the angel was trying to explain and apologise for what he'd had to do. It nearly made him recoil, that touch. Back then, he put it down to the angelic radiance Aziraphale always emitted, too much for his demonic liking, but it's only now that he realises it wasn't that average radiance your mediocre angel tended to produce. It's was Aziraphale's bloody love. It was everywhere, all the time, long before the fifteenth century gave him a taste of it.   
  
He remembers all their disputes on love, how hurt the angel always seemed to be by his caustic remarks; he remembers all those drunken nights they spent side by side when Aziraphale's eyes shone in that dazzling cerulean blue, not because of the alcohol in his system but with that feeling he had; he remembers Aziraphale's flushed cheeks when they waltzed in the nineteenth century Vienna and his glittering eyes and all his stupid excuses that he couldn't dance; he remembers the Holy Inquisition incident when the angel saved him, once again; he remembers all the humourless jokes Aziraphale made upon hearing yet another one of Queen's songs which had something to do with angels; he remembers that unusually acid  _'Especially not to you'_  on their way to Tadfield as the angel simply refused to as much as start explaining the concept of love he was able to detect there.  
  
He remembers their argument about love which they had back when Jesus was crucified, when Aziraphale told him that most angels had had soulmates whom they didn't remember anymore, something Crowley believed back then because he had no reason to do otherwise. If demons were made to forget, why would it have been any different with angels? What was the point of Aziraphale lying to him? he thought. But there was a point, after all. Of course, there was. He didn't want Crowley to know that he remembered it all, that he knew him, for whatever reason.

It could have been a coincidence, of course, Aziraphale could have developed that feeling of love to him along the way, improbable as it was, but Crowley doesn't believe in coincidences, and, anyway, there seem to be one too many. The angel must have known the truth all along, must have known  _him_  and yet never told him.   
  
And, suddenly, it hurts. Hurts more than the Holy Water on his skin, more than Aziraphale's excruciating divine healing, more than the Fall itself, and Crowley doesn't know how to get away from it. It's not a physical pain, it's worse, it seems to be pulsing and swelling inside his very being, inside his very soul, and that's already a surprise in itself. His soul should have been possessed by Lucifer, yet it turns out there is still something resembling it left inside of him. He'd run from it if he could but it seems he's been running for way too long already, and anyway, there's no place anywhere where he could possibly hide from it. No place except one, perhaps, but running there would not mean hiding. It would mean facing the truth, and Crowley's not ready for that. He wasn't before, and he isn't now, and perhaps will never be. The bloody son of Satan should never have done this to him, he should have left him be, oblivious of the truth.

In the end, Crowley does the only thing that could at least give him a period of blissful forgetfulness if not solve this great clusterfuck. He drinks himself into unconsciousness.

***


	9. Chapter 9

**Aziraphale**

***

When it comes to the things they loathe, Aziraphale and Crowley seem to stand on common ground. Just like with the demon, not knowing unnerves Aziraphale more than anything. 

Right now, the angel is inspecting his bookshop and trying to comprehend how on earth a whole bunch of comic books for children have found their way onto his shelves – he suspects it's Adam's work but, ignorant of the fact that the place with the entire collection of his precious manuscripts has actually been restored from ashes, he can't quite put his finger upon the connection between the two. This mystery, however, is not what puts him on edge, even though, yes, if he was honest with himself, he'd really prefer to find out how all those comic books have materialised in his bookshop. He doesn't particularly appreciate his collection being messed around with, even if it's the son of Satan himself who's done the deed. Especially if it's the son of Satan, in fact.

What reallymakes him anxious is the demon's behaviour. He tells himself it's only normal, a reaction to be expected from someone as paranoid by nature as Crowley has always been. They've just averted the Apocalypse, for someone's sake. The world as they know it should have ceased to exist, there should have been a war of universal proportions raging all over the place and only one side left to reign upon the ruins. Taking that in consideration, along with the fact that they had a misfortune to encounter the representatives of both sides in person, the Horsepersons, the Antichrist, the Metatron and Beelzebub and Lucifer himself, why, one would expect pretty much anyone to be feeling a bit out of their element. Aziraphale is still struggling with the entirety of it all, too, trying to grasp the fact that nothing atrocious has actually happened, that the world is still in its legitimate place and everything is pretty much all right – not worse than it had been before, anyway; and having the demon by his side right now would certainly help to restore the feeling of normality of it all. He did expect Crowley to share the sheer shock of what had happened – or had  _nearly_ happened, or had  _failed_ to happen, depending on how you look at it – with him in the same manner they've always preferred to deal with shocking situations – talking it over a glass of something strong.  
  
The Armageddon had been promised, of course, but it still came as an unpleasant surprise. They both knew – well, every single occult or ethereal being, for that matter, had always known – that it would happen, but somehow it always seemed somewhere far in the future. When Crowley burst into the bookshop in the middle of one August night to break the news of the Antichrist's successful arrival into this world, Aziraphale's first thought was that there must have been some mistake, the world wasn't ready to end, not just yet, it was still way too young and humans still hadn't realised all their tremendous potential. His second thought, which followed at the heels of the first one, was that the end of the world meant the end of  _them_.  

That latter realisation was like a sobering slap in the face, the gravity of the situation tough to deal with on his own. If –  _when_  – the world ended, it didn't even matter which side prevailed – one of them was bound to be terminated forever, Aziraphale was dead certain there would be neither amnesty, nor asylum for the defeated. Heaven and Hell were nothing but the two sides of the same coin, after all, resorting to pretty similar ways. Should it be Hell which would reign, his days would be over, which, if anything, wouldn't complicate matters much. Crowley might fret for a while, but, ultimately, unless he did something stupid – and he wouldn't, he was a survivor – he'd be all right. Yet, if Heaven was to triumph, they wouldn't have mercy for the damned, of course. There wouldn't be any point in this stupid war otherwise. They wouldn't spare Crowley, Aziraphale knew, and he wouldn't be able to live with that. 

Which, all things considered, made the oncoming Apocalypse a lose-lose situation for everyone involved. That is, unless they managed to trick both sides and somehow prevent the inevitable.

So, when Crowley proposed their intervention into the matter of the Antichrist's upbringing, Aziraphale accepted it readily, but not because of any of the arguments the demon mentioned. Heaven's lack of sushi places and decent music and bookshops and snuffboxes with intricate encrustations was, of course, an already compelling enough reason to try to avert the Apocalypse, but it had nothing to do with Aziraphale's real motives. The angel's main and most paramount reason to try to meddle with their superiors' plans was his love for Crowley. He wasn't ready to give up on it just yet, not that easily anyway, not unless he at least attempted to prevent the entire massacre on Earth and preserve what unlikely friendship they managed to have.

In some sense, the Armageddon business even took Aziraphale's mind off certain things, providing him with a necessary distraction. After all, there was some urgent and exceptionally crucial work to do and the stakes were high, so there was virtually no time for heartache. Besides, it was a novel and a truly gratifying experience to finally be able to join efforts with Crowley in order to achieve a mutual goal. And, eventually, they did it, didn't they? Ended up on the winning side, the two of them and humanity as a whole, without as much as a scratch.  

So why is he feeling so utterly unsettled now that everyone seems to have been given a second chance, after all?

It must have something to do with that bizarre way Crowley behaved when they parted two days ago, Aziraphale muses brushing the dust off some of the binds with careful fingertips. It's that weird alienation about the demon which he sensed on their way back from Tadfield which alarms the angel, a feeling unlike any kind he's ever experienced, some sort of suppressed abject terror, confusion and a sense of not quite being there all rolled in one. Something about Crowley's flat, strained tone of voice. Something about his pressed lips, as if he was barely holding himself together, and Aziraphale dearly wishes he could understand what exactly it was which made the demon that unnerved. Something about those blasted sunglasses of his that were perched on his nose, concealing whatever it was that was going on behind them.

Aziraphale sighs heavily and puts one of those comic books he's been distractedly flipping through back in its definitely not legitimate place on the shelf. He'll have to do something about them sometime later but, for now, his mind is simply not in it.   
  
_Crowley_ , he murmurs quietly into space.  _What happened there, my dear?_    
  
He tells himself it's just the stress of the past few days that gave him the impression of something being wrong. Crowley must have been under lots of it, too, which made his seem all wound up. In such situations, he knows, it's better not to pry and give Crowley some breathing space, knows it from his own bitter experience. He knows that no matter how much he wants to soothe and console and just be there, it's up to Crowley to decide whether he wants to accept his help or his company. It's just the question of how profoundly he's been affected this time and of how much time Aziraphale can allow to waste before he comes searching for him.

And he knows he will, sooner or later.

It takes him one more day before his patience runs out. Except, it's not only his patience. By the end of the third day, Aziraphale realises he's worried sick. When his worry turns into a mild case of paranoia and he starts to wonder if the demon is even in London, whether he's fled elsewhere as he's prone to doing in some particularly stressful situations, or whether he has perhaps been summoned back to Hell, or if some Duke of Hell turned up on his doorstep intending to punish him for the part he played in the failed Apocalypse, Aziraphale decides enough is enough. Crowley might be hiding there in his sterile white abode of a flat for a reason and the angel's interference could – most probably will – make him sulk for a week or two, but what the hell? It's not like Crowley's never been angry with him before; Aziraphale got over it on those multiple occasions in the past and he will get over it now, but he can't bear being ignorant any longer, nor can he stand the anxiety it provokes.

He walks to Mayfair. For one thing, it's not all that far, and, besides, even though the weather is rather lousy for late August – it's drizzling and unseasonably cold – he enjoys it all the same. It's nice to realise that there's still weather to fuss about at all. Aziraphale has never had anything against rain, unlike Crowley who's always preferred milder and dryer climate, which makes it highly likely that he is home, after all, sleeping, or drinking there alone, or busy terrorising his plants. That's what he tells himself while he's making his way to Crowley's home, that the demon is indeed there, safe and sound, perhaps still trapped in that weird unnerved state of his, but home and fine, all the same. Aziraphale isn't going to raise the topic right away. Crowley's never been particularly fond of heart-to-heart conversations, not when it was likely to get way too sensitive for his liking, so he wouldn't want to make him all uncomfortable right from the start. They'll begin with the wine and the failed Armageddon, and then Aziraphale will see how it's going to turn out. Maybe there's nothing else to discuss but the fact of the world's improbable continuing existence in the first place, and oh, wouldn't that be just nice. Yet, the angel suspects, there's more to Crowley's agitated state rather than the Apocalypse. The end of the world loomed on the horizon for eleven years but Crowley never was in a state like this before.

For decency's sake, Aziraphale spends a while ringing Crowley's doorbell – it wouldn't be appropriate to just unceremoniously let himself in, no matter how increasingly worried he's becoming. Standing here facing the closed door, the angel is beginning to feel that weird sort of restlessness again, even though, as of yet, there's no real reason for him to be. Well, the demon refuses to open his door, but it's not like he's always been the most hospitable of hosts. For all he knows, Crowley might be in his king-size bed sleeping it all off.

When the angel's patience finally runs out and he's about to miracle the bloody door unlocked, the owner of the flat finally makes an appearance. Aziraphale breathes out a sigh of relief and is on the verge of scolding the demon for being one hell of an unwelcoming demon, but whatever words he was going to utter die down before they have the chance to roll off the tip of his tongue.

What he sees in front of himself is somehow all wrong, whichever way he looks at it. It is Crowley all right, in one piece and seemingly safe and sound, as far as Aziraphale can judge anyway, but he's never before seen him quite like this, that much he's sure of. The demon looks semi-catatonic, either extremely hungover or perhaps under the influence of some drug. Aziraphale wouldn't believe it could be possible, but it looks like Crowley's lost weight in, what, three days? He's never been anything more than slender, and now he seems positively emaciated. He's leaning on the doorframe heavily, standing barefooted on his spotless tiled floor. His black shirt – the same one he wore on the day of the Apocalypse, the angel notices with an unfurling sense of horror – is untucked and all wrinkled as if he's been sleeping in it ever since then. The sleeves are rolled up to his elbows, and his wrists look thin and pale, brittle somehow.

His thinness, though, is not the worst. There's something about Crowley's gaunt face and sunken eyes which are nowhere near as bright as they normally are. His hair's a mess, a few strands plastered to his forehead, and there are lines running down from his nostrils to the downturned corners of his mouth. There's not enough light either in the hall or in the stairwell to be sure, but his skin looks ashen and the circles under his eyes are bordering purplish. If Aziraphale's ever seen any human looking like this, it must have been some drug addicts in the worst throes of their withdrawal, but in relation to Crowley that's ridiculous. He doesn't need to get addicted to anything in the first place and he doesn't need to go through withdrawal. There's a stale, sour stench of alcohol wafting out from the lounge, though, which makes it obvious as to what the demon's been doing.

There's something very seriously wrong with Crowley, even more wrong than it was when they parted three days ago, and Aziraphale curses himself for his stupid decision to leave the demon on his own. He should have persuaded Crowley to come by, or should have gone with him. He had an excuse, of course, the failed Apocalypse was stressful enough for him, too, but…

"Crowley…?" the angel asks, suddenly very scared. The demon's eyes are bloodshot and there's so much pain in them, real, tangible pain. "My dear? Are you--"

"Leave," Crowley interrupts him. His voice sounds dull and listless, complementing his looks.

"Don't be ridiculous," the angel says and puts his hand on Crowley's forearm urging him to step back and let him inside. "I'm not going anywhere until you tell me on Earth has happened."

The moment his fingers touch Crowley's skin, the demon does step back, with a hiss he doesn't seem to even be aware of. He jerks his arm away and then stops there in the middle of his sterile white hall, looking inexplicably out of place with his bare feet on that gleaming marble floor and dressed in that fancy but wrinkled outfit.

"The Apocalypse has failed to happen," he says. Aziraphale notices with even greater alarm that he's breathing heavily as if there was not enough oxygen here for him. But he doesn't even need to breathe, for someone's sake.

"So it has," the angel agrees softly, steps inside and closes the front door behind him. "I'm not talking about that, and you know it. What's the meaning of this--"

He reaches out to Crowley again but when his hand touches Crowley's shoulder, the demon recoils with a gasp.

"Don’t touch me," he spits out as if he were burnt, startling Aziraphale.

"My dear, are you--"

"No, I'm not, Aziraphale!" All of a sudden, Crowley is nearly yelling, and it's a wonder he's still got enough strength left in him to do it. "No, I'm bloody well  _not_ all right."

Aziraphale freezes to the spot, hand still in the air, watching him with a growing sense of impending doom. Something must have happened, right after the Apocalypse. Something seriously wrong must have happened to have done this to Crowley, and he realises he can't even quite define the elusive  _this_. But before the angel has the time to voice the most obvious question, Crowley speaks again.

"Sssix thousand years," he hisses, quietly once more, and this rapid change of temper alarms the angel even further. "Six thousand years, Aziraphale, and you've never told me."

Crowley's eyes, those stunning snake-like eyes that Aziraphale has come to love so much, bore at him with accusation so profound the angel finds himself completely confused. What exactly could he have possibly done wrong either during the Apocalypse or on their way back to London to make Crowley this affronted? And what was it about the six thousand years? Is it about something that took place back in the Garden? But that's ridiculous. The angel racks his brain but cannot come up with anything at all which could explain Crowley's behaviour.

"My dear, I'm afraid you've lost me here. What--"

"I  _lost_ you," Crowley echoes with an utterly irate huff. "Yeah, I did, all right, those six thousand years ago, I  _did_ lose you, you bastard."

"Crowley," Aziraphale murmurs, his lips not quite obeying him all of a sudden.

"I did lose you," Crowley repeats, "and you kept it all away from me until the moment the son of Satan himself decided to kindly drop that clusterfuck of knowledge right into my head, all the six-thousand-year-old worth of it!"

The demon's voice rises in accusation again and he points his finger at the middle of Aziraphale's chest. The angel looks down at it, now utterly dumbfounded, at the way it trembles, and then shifts his gaze back to the demon, the understanding – awful in its enormity – finally starting to dawn on him.

"You…" Aziraphale starts and then trails off, swallows and gives speaking another try. "You remember…?"

Crowley shakes his head, looking as if he is about to have a nervous breakdown, his unblinking eyes shining feverishly in the gloom of his immaculate white hall.

"Yes, I bloody do, the Fall and what was before the Fall, Heaven and the blasted divinity all around, and, of all things, I do remember  _you_ , and I wish I didn't, Aziraphale, I wish I could fucking forget it all, all over again. You've spent these six millennia with me, ever since the Garden, and you've never…" here, Crowley's voice breaks, and Aziraphale isn't sure he's ever heard him sound this dismayed. "What the fuck am I supposed to do with all this knowledge now?!" he flings up his arms and his voice crosses that subtle border where it turns into something bordering a desperate scream.

"Crowley…" Aziraphale whispers because he doesn't seem to be able to speak normally anymore. He feels grounded to the spot, as if Crowley's suddenly regained memory, all the six-thousand-year-old worth of it, is weighing down on him. "I…"

He reaches out, wanting to touch Crowley yet again, make sure he's real and  _this_  is happening for real, wanting to soothe himas much as himself, but the demon shies away immediately.

"Don't touch me!" he hisses, shaking his head. "Don't touch me, I'm a demon, I don't bloody need either your divine sympathy or your love!"

Aziraphale lets his hand fall limply down along his side.

"My dear… Crowley, please, let me… I didn't… Oh my goodness, let me explain it--"

"Explain what, Aziraphale?" Crowley snaps. "Explain how you've been lying to me for six millennia? Explain why the Antichrist did this to me? Explain what the fuck I'm supposed to do with it? Explain  _what_?"

"Crowley, please--"

"And if he hadn't, if he hadn't  _forced_  all those memories back into my head, you'd keep lying to me for another six thousand years, huh? And what about the Apocalypse, huh? If we hadn't stopped that shit, you'd have kept pretending till the very end of it all? That we hadn't known each other? That we hadn't been--" he trails off then, abruptly, breathing heavily and looking directly at Aziraphale, as if daring him to try and explain it all to him now when it's suddenly too late.

But the angel remains silent. Because, in a sense, Crowley's right. He had his reasons for holding the truth back, of course, and he could never have imagined that it would be possible for Crowley to remember anything which was Before--

"Yeah, you would, wouldn't you?" the demon says, this time quietly, answering his own question, and then shakes his head and takes an unsteady step backwards, towards the door.

Aziraphale reaches out for him, again, instinctively. "Crowley, please, let me explain--"

"No, Aziraphale," the demon says bitterly and shakes his head. There are tears in his eyes, actual tears – and who knew that demons were capable of crying.

"My dear, you don't understand--" Aziraphale all but pleads but he's cut off when the front door is slammed right into his face.

"Please," he mutters to the closed door. "I can't lose you again, Crowley."

But there's no response, of course, and when he steps out into the stair landing, there's no sign of the demon anywhere in sight.

"Bugger," the angel murmurs under his breath, way too calmly considering the situation they're in, but that perhaps could be attributed to the state of sheer shock he's in.

Yet, maybe it's this shell-shocked state and the calmness induced by it which allows Aziraphale to actually act instead of sliding down the wall to the floor and wallowing in the mixture of despair, self-pity and fear. He doesn't even bother to go down the stairs – he opens the window in the stair landing, steps out onto the ledge, mindful not to tear his clothes against the latch, and takes off in the only direction he knows Crowley might have headed. Thankfully, six millennia spent alongside the demon is a sufficient period of time to have been able to learn his various preferences.

St. James's is where he would be off to if he wished to contemplate something. He'd circle the park, again and again, watching visitors, watching the fauna, watching the staff, pondering on whatever it is that preoccupied him. Never feeding the ducks, though, never without Aziraphale. If he is annoyed, the chance is high of encountering Crowley in one of the crowded public places creating minor cases of mischief such as tying people's shoelaces or dropping dead flies into their drinks. He'd be closeted in his Mayfair flat, either binge-drinking himself into oblivion or binge-reading pretty much anything he could put his hands on, or alternating the two, whenever he was either bored to death or having some kind of existential crisis.

And then there is a place where Crowley would rush to seeking refuge if he was feeling miserable, the very top of St. Paul's cathedral's dome, and at moments like this tourists and the staff alike would find themselves surprised and disappointed that it's actually closed for some kind of restoration works nobody knew about. There's another place for that kind of thing, too, Aziraphale's bookshop, but there are some things Crowley is simply unwilling to share with him. Sometimes, Aziraphale respects his personal space and does not intrude, allowing the demon the much-needed solitude. On other occasions, he ventures out to seek him and, more often than not, without saying a single word he just stays beside Crowley, yearning to soothe him and not knowing how.

So this time around, St. Paul's is where Aziraphale is headed, mighty white wings flapping against the gales and the drizzle. At moments like this, he wishes he had that weird ability of Crowley to turn himself into a flash bastard because right now every single minute of hesitation seems like it might have tremendous consequences for both of them. On his way, he wonders anxiously how much Crowley is actually able to recall. All of the events prior to his Fall? Some of them? Or does he have only vague recollections? Aziraphale feels an urgent necessity to talk to him, to explain everything before the demon manages to construct his own theory on what was and what is and what will be, which is bound to be wrong. Oh Lord, he must already have done so, in those days since the Apocalypse, judging by his reaction.

All that aside, though, what Aziraphale really wants most of all is to find Crowley and take him in his arms and hold him there until that bloody agitation, that paranoia-laced panic he's sometimes susceptible to, leaves him completely. He won't listen to Aziraphale until it does, and it's crucial that he listens.

The angel does find him where expected, at the gallery at the top of it, leaning against the bannister with his face buried in his hands, black hair flying wildly around his head in the gusts of wind; a petite, cowering silhouette curled on itself against the grandeur of the cathedral. Aziraphale lands with just a soft thud of his sensible shoes on stone and winches his wings away. It's rather brisk out here but all Crowley's still wearing is his trousers, badly rumpled, and his untucked shirt, his shoeless and sockless feet pale against the ancient, weather-worn stone. He doesn't move, either not aware of or not willing to acknowledge his presence, so Aziraphale covers the distance between them – merely a few steps – and ever so cautiously, as if Crowley were some sort of a wild wounded animal with utterly unpredictable temper instead of his life-long friend, lets his fingers run a tender caress over the demon's shirt-clad back. Beneath his hand, Crowley's body feels like a live wire, thrumming with tension and shivering with cold in this blasted wind-blown place he favours, for whatever reason, as his safe haven.

As it happens, celestial beings are very keen perceivers of others' feelings, angelic or human alike. Demons, however, are not normally within the range of their empathetic ability. Firstly, there is not much to empathise with, and even if there were, there would normally be way too little time between encountering a demon and smiting one for any sort of empathy to be invoked in an angel. As far as Crowley and Aziraphale are concerned, though, it seems as if rules have been bent for them in this particular issue, too, just like in many others.

The angel doesn't know – and doesn't particularly care to know, either, not anymore, not after six thousand years of it – whether it happens because Crowley is a totally different kind of demon, or because of the length of time they've spent side by side, or the fact that Aziraphale had known him and loved him long before they met on Earth, or all of those combined. Normally, he's simply grateful to have this ability, especially since Crowley's never been one to banter about his true feelings. That said, at moments like this, when Aziraphale can almost  _touch_ Crowley's pain, panic and confusion, when he can sense every single shade of the demon's despair, he wishes he couldn't feel anything all.

"Oh dear," he murmurs under his breath as the intensity of Crowley's emotions overwhelm him, leaving him dizzy and breathless.  _"Oh my dear…"_

Crowley remains as he was, silent and motionless, but that's all right. Anything is better than the wall of alienation he has built around himself over the centuries, the wall which Aziraphale has repeatedly slammed into every time he tried to dig deeper to decipher his true feelings. For the time being, because of his confusion or because he's way too exhausted to care, this wall seems to be only half erected.

Tentatively, Aziraphale reaches out and lets his arm wrap all the way around the demon's waist, hesitantly pulling him closer. When there's no resistance, he leans in, his other hand coming to rest on Crowley's shoulder, thus effectively securing him in his embrace. The demon grows a little tenser, but that's all. He just keeps standing there like that, silent and shivering, his breathing ragged and fast and shallow.

"Crowley…" Aziraphale whispers against the top of the demon's head, a bit unsteadily.

He feels the silky black strands brush against his face, tickling his skin, and on the spur of the moment, provoked by this unlikely closeness, the angel allows himself to nuzzle his lips against them. It's not a kiss, but it's as much as he dares to do. In his arms, Crowley shivers more violently, letting out a sound that's on the verge of transforming from a sigh into a groan.

"Let's go, please," the angel murmurs, and there go all his attempts to sound calm and reasonable. His voice breaks in the midst of what he's saying. 

It's almost mesmerising how fast it happens every time, that barely kindling hope, more dead than alive during these past several hundred years, suddenly coming to life. Aziraphale tries to smother it, fight against it, reject it because it's too early for hope, there's nothing to hope for, not yet, not now when they still have so much explaining to do, but it seems it's beyond his power to control.

"Please, Crowley," he pleads, and because his heart is beating traitorously fast in his throat, his voice is shaking as badly as Crowley's breathing. "Let me take you home and let me explain it all to you, long overdue, but better late than never, isn't it?"

Still, there's no answer but there's something else, something strange happening as a considerable part of tension leaves Crowley's body and he sags against Aziraphale with a shaky sigh, allowing himself to be held. His head leaves his hands and comes to rest against the angel's shoulder. Despite the howling wind, Aziraphale can detect the demon's breathing as well as feel it in the ragged movements of his ribcage.

In an attempt to soothe, he strokes Crowley's back and shoulders, trying to rub some warmth into his frigid body. It doesn't seem to soothe him, however. If anything, Crowley only starts to shiver more violently.

"'Zzziraphale," he mumbles hoarsely, almost breathlessly, as if he were suffocating.

"Yes, my dear?"

" _Ssstop_ ," Crowley hisses with obvious difficulty, and something icy-cold seems to pierce through the angel's chest. Pieces of his shattered hope, most probably. "Please, stop doing this."

Oddly enough, Crowley doesn't sound exactly panicked, Aziraphale remarks somewhere at the back of his consciousness all the while his hopes are experiencing yet another clinical death. Crowley sounds like someone begging for mercy, someone who's already reconciled with his fate and merely asks for deliverance from his suffering, not really hoping that his plea will actually be granted.

It hurts Aziraphale to hear him speak like this, hurts even more so to comply to his request, but the angel cannot help it, cannot do it, cannot torment Crowley even more. Slowly and reluctantly, he loosens his embrace, letting the demon move away. The latter buries his face in his hands again, for a while doing nothing more than shivering and gasping for air, as if this mere closeness to Aziraphale is killing him. Perhaps it just is. The angel winces, swallows and looks down at the tips of his shoes, doing the best he can to swallow the painful disappointment along the way. The bloody fool, yet again.

"I'm so sorry, my dear," he says ever so quietly. The wind is howling around them but he's not sure he'd be able to raise his voice to make himself heard. Whisper is all he can manage because he's hurting, too. "It's just so natural for me to want to soothe that I keep forgetting that my comforting does you more harm than good."

"Angel…" Crowley mutters, and the wind steals his words away from his lips immediately.

"It's all right," Aziraphale says softly, even though he does not think so, no, not really. "I understand." He stopped understanding anything at all around the moment the Apocalypse didn't happen.

"No." Crowley shakes his head now raking the fingers of both of his hands through his hair. He seems to be on the verge of a breakdown, if demons can have one. "No, you bloody don't."

"Then explain it to me," Aziraphale says. "Please. And I'll do my best to explain all I know to you."

After a while of excruciating silence, thankfully, the demon nods, with face still hidden in his hands.

"Yeah," he finally says. "Okay."

***

 


	10. Chapter 10

_***_

Predictably, they end up in the bookshop, without a single word spoken by either of them on their way there from St. Paul's and the only sounds for company being the flapping of their mighty wings and whistling of the wind. When they land right in front of the porch, still silent, the demon unlocks the front door with a mere flick of his hand, wearily steps inside and, with a snap of his fingers, silences the bell in mid-jingle, every single movement practised by centuries. 

 _He belongs here_ , Aziraphale muses in sudden surprise as if he'd never seen Crowley doing it,  _always has._ This  _is his place, not the Mayfair._  

The thought echoes with blossoming of warmth in his chest, and is then followed by an icy pinprick of fear because nothing's certain between the two of them yet.  
  
Once they're inside, it is Aziraphale's job to lock the door behind them. The angel does it manually, turning an old-fashioned key in the old-fashioned lock which Crowley has been pestering him to change for ages and which Aziraphale has never got around to doing. Once it's done, by sheer force of habit he heads straight for the kitchen, for the time being leaving Crowley to his own devices. Even though he isn't the one whose memories were forced into his head, Aziraphale, too, needs some of the routine normality back in his life like nothing else, so the first thing he does in the kitchen is put the kettle on the stove. His hands are shaking but the familiarity of the hum the kettle produces after a short while is soothing enough to make him relax just a little.  
  
"Tea?" he calls, not really expecting any reply at all given the state the demon is in but he does receive an affirmative  _uh-huh_ , which reassures him a bit more.  
  
When Aziraphale returns, with two steaming tea cups and a bowl of cookies on a small tray – someone knows why on earth he's arranged it all, he's not either hungry or thirsty – he finds Crowley standing beside the window, looking out. The angel places the tray on the counter with exaggerated care and then, a little uncertainly, joins the demon at his vigil by the window, leaving a decent distance of a few feet between them notwithstanding his desire to wrap Crowley into a tight embrace. The silence stretches for quite some time, and Aziraphale has to admit it is anything but the comfortable type they've come to share over the thousands of years of being acquainted with each other. This one feels oppressive, threatening even, all the lies they've told each other – or more like, all the lies _he_ 's told Crowley, or everything which he _hasn't_ told him at all – weighing down on the very air inside the room.

"Was it Adam?" he finally asks in a quiet voice, not sure it's the right way to start the conversation but not knowing what else to begin with.   
  
It must have been. Even considering his own lack of understanding of what exactly happened to Crowley, this is his best guess. He still can't wrap his head around the details, though.

The demon sighs and then sticks his hands into the pockets of his trousers. The angel glances down and notices that Crowley's feet are now socked but, just like before, they lack shoes. Inside the bookshop, it's getting rather dim as the twilight falls outside but there's still enough light spilling in through the half-drawn curtains. It turns Crowley's unreadable face into a stony mask, thus making his chiselled features even sharper and, at the same time, somehow making him look inexplicably more vulnerable. At moments like this, Crowley's angelic origin is hard to miss.

"Yeah," the demon finally says. "I'm pretty sure it was. Can't point a finger at anyone else, not really."

"Why--" Aziraphale interrupts himself before he can finish, knowing perfectly well that there have always been way too many  _why's_  without any answers whatsoever, and this one is most certainly among them. "How did he do it?" he asks instead, a bit lamely.

Crowley shrugs with one shoulder, his lips twisted into a crooked thin line of distaste.

"He looked at me and then, apparently sticking to the good old tradition Hell maintains, simply dropped the entire clusterfuck of memories right back into my head, everything that was before the... before I Fell."

"Oh dear…" Aziraphale mouths, stunned.

He knows how much Crowley loathes Hell's preferred way of communication and doesn't really want to even start to imagine what it must have felt like to him to reclaim all those lost recollections while being trapped smack in the middle of the Apocalypse. The jury's still out on what exactly the demon's able to remember, though.

"Yeah," Crowley huffs humourlessly. "'twas pretty nasty. Still is. I used to assume that  _'to fuck with one's mind'_  was a metaphor, but I think I've come very close to experiencing the physical manifestation of it."

"So you really do remember…" Aziraphale hesitates, not sure as to how to wrap it up so that it would sound adequate, but the demon spares him the necessity.

"Yes, I do, pretty much everything. I think so, anyway," he sighs. "I remember myself back there in Heaven, and you, too.  _Us_." He says the last word so quietly Aziraphale nearly misses it altogether. " _Sssoulmates_ ," he goes on, hissing, as if it helps to push the word out of his mouth by force.

Now, a little smile appears on the demon's lips but it looks anything  _but_  happy.

The angel wants to say something, he even opens his mouth to reply, but no sound comes out. He tries again and once again fails because he is completely lost for words. No matter how much he ever wished that Crowley could remember everything, now that it seems that it has finally happened – improbable as it is – he simply cannot say anything to him, not a single word. He just stands there with his mouth hanging slightly open and stares at Crowley, at his sharply defined profile and his slouched shoulders, not having even a vague clue as to what to do now. He wants to ask what Crowley feels, he wants to ask him if he remembers loving him, he wants to ask why he Fell but all of it is seemingly beyond his articulating ability.

"You have known, Aziraphale. I know you have, all along. Must have…" Crowley murmurs, with his eyes still fixed on some invisible spot outside, and then he adds, even more quietly, "And you never told me. Why did it have to be the Antichrist who did?"

Aziraphale's every instinct, as an angel and as a friend and as a one-time lover and soulmate, cries out to him to do something to banish that bitterness out of the demon's voice, take him in an embrace so tight that it would manage to somehow smother the pain in it, but he remains where he is, those several feet still between them, because he knows that Crowley most likely needs no consolation from him. What he does deserve is the truth, long overdue and perhaps hardly pleasant.

"Because you wouldn't have believed me?" the angel says quietly, offering his only excuse, his intonation rising as if it were a question.  
  
At this, the demon turns his head so sharply Aziraphale has to suppress an instinctive urge to recoil because Crowley's eyes, those magnificent, tantalising, beautiful eyes, are blazing, and the angel can't quite tell whether it is fury or pain or indignation which fuels it.

"Who said I wouldn't?" he hisses. "How can you say that when you never even tried?!"

Crowley's face looks as if he's in physical pain and the angel wishes he could do something to make that wounded and dismayed look go away. But he dares not. He's terrified Crowley would shun him, turn around and flee again, and he is desperate not to allow anything like that to happen.

"But I did, my dear," he murmurs, holding the demon's burning gaze. "I did try. At least I think I did…"

When all Crowley gives him is a sarcastic quirk of an eyebrow, the angel goes on, very softly.

"Do you remember all the conversations we've had on the topic of love over the years? Ever since I met you in the Garden, you've kept making a point that, in your opinion, there was no such thing as love, even as far as Heaven was concerned. Admittedly, at first, I did toy with the idea of revealing the truth I knew, but every time before I got as far as formulating it in words, you proved that nothing connected with Heaven held any significance to you. You negated love time and time again, the mere notion of it, vigorously. So do you really think you'd have believed me if I'd told you that I'd known you once, a different you, the one I—" Aziraphale trails off, biting his lip, and casts his eyes down.

He still doesn't know how much Crowley can remember, and whether love,  _their_  love, is among those recollections that have been given back to him.

For a while, the demon remains silent and then, instead of an answer, he asks a question if his own.

"You told me angels had had their memories of what was Before wiped out, just like us. You lied, didn't you? Despite the Arrangement, you lied to me."  
  
"They did," Aziraphale sighs, meets Crowley's gaze and then drops his eyes again, unable to withstand the accusation in them. "I lied about myself."

"They don't remember, either?"

"No," Aziraphale sighs and shakes his head lightly. "It's just me."  
  
"Why?" Crowley's voice is so low it's merely a whisper.   
  
"If you're asking me why I was allowed to remember, I don't know. I thought it might have been some malfunction in their system, so I kept my mouth shut about it. I didn't think it was against orders because there really were no orders about anything. I didn't want those memories to be taken away from me, painful though they were, because they were all I had left reminding me of… of you," Aziraphale lets out a shaky sigh, wishing his voice wouldn't betray him this much. "And as to why I didn't tell you the truth…" he shrugs and doesn't say anything for a while. "There was absolutely no reason for you to believe in what I could tell you, at least I thought so. And I was also afraid – terrified really – that you'd… I don't know, Crowley, that you'd take it too hard, run and refuse to have anything to do with me. I was afraid to lose you again when it seemed I'd just found you, unlikely as it was. And I couldn't lose you, not after I already had, once."

Azirahale raises his eyes to give Crowley an anxious look, to see his reaction, because, ultimately, he's just confessed his innermost feelings, but the demon's gaze is once again directed at something outside the window.  
  
"Did you know it was me, back in the Garden?" the demon asks, still without looking at him. "I mean, the one… ah, fuck, there're so many  _me's_  to talk about now."

"I did not. You didn't look particularly familiar, after all…" the angel shrugs again. "I was devastated back then, it felt as if a piece of my own soul had been taken away from me with your Fall, and I believe it was exactly what had happened, but then you turned up and became the only other being who actually did something to distract me from my grief. I did like you back then and I didn't really want you to come to harm, despite the trouble you'd created there. And, later, when, by sheer accident, I bumped into you in your human form, when you nearly slit my throat--"

To Aziraphale's surprise, the demon actually winces, and his larynx bobs as he swallows hard.

"Admittedly, I did think that it might be some Hellish trick to deceive me, because just how likely was it that you could be there on Earth, too, visibly unchanged, after you'd Fallen? We hadn't been told what exactly had happened to any of you, so, yes, I did think it was some kind of trap, but it was only for a moment. I knew it was you, I could  _feel_  it was you, somehow. I didn't know how I was going to live with that, exist on the very same planet as you did, keeping appearances all the time, pretending I hadn't known you Before, pretending I didn't still love you, having to listen to how you negate love as a phenomenon while I knew perfectly well that you were wrong, that love existed and that you were – had been, anyway – capable of it. And then I thought that perhaps it was a chance. That maybe it didn't matter that you had no memory of the past, that maybe I would manage to show you what love was, all over again, and the past wouldn't even matter anymore. It was probably way too far-fetched, but what else could I really do?" Aziraphale sighs and falls silent for a few moments. "But you didn't answer my question, Crowley. When you insist that I should have told you, do you really think you'd have believed me?"

Crowley pulls in a sharp inhale and then lets the air out thorough his nose. His eyes leave whatever he's been studying outside and shift to his toes.

"I don't know, angel," he murmurs. "Seems like I've stopped knowing anything at all, what with the bloody Apocalypse and now  _this_ ," he huffs, humourlessly, and then adds, sounding almost nonchalant, "I killed one of the Dukes of Hell, you know? Poured a whole fucking bucket of Holy Water right on his stupid head, just before I headed to Tadfield. They'd come to collect me, as they put it, for screwing up that thing with the Antichrist, so I… I just thought the world was about to end anyway, what did it matter if I obliterated one demonic being prematurely?" he huffs bitterly and shrugs. "I guess I must be in Hell's back books now."

"Oh my…" Aziraphale murmurs, stunned. Just how much did he miss? "I didn't know--"

"Of course, you didn't. You were elsewhere while your bookshop was ablaze, with all your precious volumes in flames, and you weren't even here. I couldn't even imagine where you were at that moment, and I just needed to--" he trails off.

"The bookshop…  _what_? Oh…" the angel gasps as the understanding suddenly dawns on him.

 _Shadwell, right_. There were candles all over the place, weren't there? Must have burnt to the floor and then the old dry wood caught up. It seems like it happened in another lifetime. Explains the presence of those comic books on the shelves, too.

Crowley gives him a sideways glance. His expression is hard to decipher in now almost complete darkness.

"Must have burnt to the ground by the moment I got to Tadfield. No idea what'd happened. Anyway, here it is now, good as new, just like the Bentley. Not a single scratch on it." The demon shakes his head incredulously. "I guess this is what schizophrenia feels like. There's your car, unscathed and gleaming in the sun, which you know was a burnt piece of junk just an hour or so ago because you were the one driving it along the blazing M40. And there's also myself, the way I've known myself for six millennia –  _thought I knew myself, anyway_  – and now there's suddenly that other me, and a whole trainwreck of memories along with it, and the only thing which keeps them together and indicates that I'm not totally out of my mind is you. I don't know  _what_  I am anymore, Aziraphale, and you're asking me how I'd have reacted… when? If you'd told me in the beginning – the beginning I always thought of as the beginning, I mean, after the Garden – I'd have laughed at you, thought you were joking. If you'd told me after that Inquisition business--" Crowley falls silent abruptly.

Aziraphale smiles, sorrowfully.  _So it still haunts him,_  he thinks,  _but then again, of course it does. It should, shouldn't it? He's a demon. Must've been tough on him._

"I am sorry for it, Crowley," he says softly. "I guess I had no right to do anything like that to you. Should have known just how uncomfortable it would make you feel. I never apologised for it, and I should have. But I couldn't imagine it would be… that it would be that hard on you; I thought you could simply put it down to lust and get over it. Oh, bugger," Aziraphale sighs and shakes his head. "This is so ridiculous, with me being an angel and you being a demon. I don't even know what exactly I put you through, the only thing I wanted to achieve was make you feel better after what'd happened."

"Sex for consolation, huh?" Crowley huffs humourlessly. "Angel, you're even more of a bastard than I could have possibly imagined. I thought it's not something that would be in your job description, fucking demons back to life."

The amount of sheer profound distress in Crowley's voice seasoned with spite as if to conceal it in the first place makes Aziraphale wince.

"You know it isn't, Crowley," he sighs, afraid to say something wrong, afraid to give him the wrong – or the right – impression. "Yes, partly, it was for consolation, yours, because you were in pain, but it was about me, too, I… Making you uncomfortable wasn't my intention at all. If anything, I thought with you being a demon, you could even get a commendation for corrupting an angel, or something of that sort. I reckoned lust should come naturally to you, even if you weren't able to feel the love."

"Well, you bet it does come naturally, and it did back then, don't think you could've missed that," Crowley says slowly, still talking mainly to his toes. "And I did get a commendation, in fact. It was just… Lust wasn't the only thing about it, you should be able to know it."

As his gaze is pinned down, he cannot see Aziraphale's eyes widen with surprise.

"I could feel…" the demon goes on with a sigh, the sound coming out shaky, and then rakes his fingers through his already ruffled hair. "Oh, blessit,  _I_   _could feel your love_ ; hell, Satan himself would have been able to, and you got me terrified. I wasn't supposed to be able to even as much as recognise that kind of thing, let alone actually feel it, and I didn't want to feel it, Aziraphale. Not from you. Least of all from you," he says quietly, and the similarity of what he's just said to what Aziraphale told him on their way to Tadfield prior to the Apocalypse makes an odd coincidence.  
  
Just how ironic is it all going to get in the end? The angel thinking that he wouldn't be able to explain the phenomenon of love to the demon who is, as a matter of fact, able to perceive it; the demon not wanting to acknowledge love and ending up doing it all the same. 

"Why not from me?" he asks, his lips growing unpleasantly numb.

"I'm a demon, Aziraphale. By that moment, I'd been a demon for five and a half millennia,  _designed_ to be unable to love or perceive love or whatnot. And I was perfectly fine with that. Every time I told you I didn't believe in love, I meant every single word I said. When I told you that what you considered to be that pure, selfless love I took for convenience and mutual profit, I did mean it. When I said that the most reliable sort of relationship could only be achieved by some type of a deal that both sides sign, I did mean it, and that was precisely what  _we_  had, the Arrangement. That was the thing that made you a friend, in my eyes, anyway. The mutual convenience. The pre-discussed terms and conditions. The points in the contract that encompassed pretty much everything. And then you came barging in on me with that love of yours, and I  _could_ feel it, Aziraphale, do you understand? Five and a half millennia of being convinced that love was a mere fragment of your people's imagination all good for nothing because there you were, the only being I thought I could trust, doing something to me which was not in the Arrangement, which was…" Crowley trails off and shakes his head, helplessly.

"Why didn't you stop me?" Aziraphale asks, his voice dull, now completely stunned by all those totally unexpected confessions. "If I'd known it was that bad…"

"Because, as I said, I was terrified beyond my speaking ability," the demon interrupts him and then says something which, weren't the angel already speechless, would certainly do the job. "And because it wasn't  _all that bad_  at all, which terrified me even more. Feeling your love wasn't all that bad, Aziraphale, no matter how much I didn't want to believe in its existence. Perhaps it would seem nonsense to your kind, but it's… there's no such thing as love in Hell, angel, I should not have been able to feel it, let alone survive it. Had no right to survive it."

Aziraphale wants to say something but cannot. His mind is racing, the confused runaway train of his thought venturing into the territories he's yet way too cautious to even start to consider. But the implications of what Crowley has just said are stubbornly reverberating through his conscious thought, making him want to let that train go on running out of control till it probably terminates itself in a mind-numbing crash.

"And now, as if to add insult to injury, I'm suddenly granted the full access to my memory, and it turns out it is full of recollections of  _you_ back in Heaven, so different from everything else I thought I knew, which means I must have been wrong for six thousand years, and you never told me a single thing, angel, and, honestly, I feel like I'm going insane as I need to somehow piece that new knowledge I now have into the model of the world I thought I knew, and I'm far from coming anywhere near puling that off."  
  
Crowley pulls in a shaky inhale once he's done with his tirade and shakes his head, looking awfully tired and lost. For a while, all Aziraphale can do is stare out the window into the gathering darkness outside because looking at the demon feels like too much of a challenge right now. It seems as if he's dreaming it all.  
  
"So you've known ever since that I love you?" he finally asks, his lips refusing to cooperate because he never expected to have a chance to say anything like that to Crowley.

He's also shocked by his own ignorance. More than half a millennium, and he never noticed it? Just how prejudiced to Crowley must he have been to miss it altogether? And then, of all things, reprimand him with his inability to perceive love?   
  
"I knew nothing, Aziraphale," Crowley says quietly. "I  _felt_ it. It was worse."  
  
Aziraphale winces, knowing perfectly well that he shouldn't really be surprised to hear that.   
  
"I'm so sorry," he says, and Heaven knows he is; sorry for inflicting this pain on the demon; sorry for himself for having to go through millennia of  _this_.   
  
He's so used to being the only one who remembers what had been Before that the fact of Crowley's newly accumulated knowledge still hasn't hit home. That's why when the demon speaks again, it startles him like a slap in the face.  
  
"But now I remember  _loving_ you, too, back there in Heaven," Crowley says, voice soft and awed, and it makes the angel raise his eyes to look at the demon again – there is no change, Crowley's still gazing out of the window, golden eyes distant as if he were staring inside himself.

When he falls silent, he finally gives Aziraphale an openly agonised glance and then lowers his eyes once more. Very tentatively, the angel takes a step closer and then gingerly places his hand onto the demon's shoulder. Crowley tenses immediately, as if preparing for a blow, and then pulls in an erratic inhale. He doesn't move away, though, which is a miracle in itself. Distractedly, Aziraphale wonders just what it takes him to stay where he is and not bolt away.

"Crowley…" he murmurs. He wants to ask so many things but he's ridiculously deprived of words. Perhaps it's for the better, after all. He finally settles in for another apology. "I am sorry. I'm sorry you have to go through all this. I'm sorry I never found enough courage to tell you. I…" he trails off, wishing he could simply take the demon in his arms and, somehow, take his pain and confusion away. "I'm sorry that you had to know it all this way…"

"I know nothing, Aziraphale," Crowley says dully. "I thought I knew, but I don't. I want to go to sleep, if you excuse me."

The angel nods slowly, jarred by that unasked for formality.

"Of course. I'll prepare the bed upstairs, all right? Sleep works miracles, doesn't it?" he falls silent, realising he's babbling.

He doesn't quite know what else he could possibly say, so he gives Crowley's shoulder a careful brief squeeze and heads for the upstairs bedroom, hoping it isn't some trick Crowley used to get rid of him and finally be able to flee. On the other hand, if the demon still wants to run now, there's probably nothing Aziraphale could do to hold him here against his will. If he runs, he runs.

Yet, when he comes downstairs a short while later, done with arranging the bed, Crowley is still slouching in the same spot by the window, looking out but seemingly lost and trapped in the labyrinth of his own memories inside his head. To the angel, who's known him as a demon for six millennia and as an angel long before his Fall, he suddenly appears in a totally new light, some weird, inexplicable combination of his former, more gentle and compassionate angelic self, and the flash bastard of a demon with cynical curve of his lips he's been acquainted with for the past six thousand years. All in all, it makes him seem awfully fragile, and his skinny build, dishevelled hair and his rumpled clothes only intensify the impression. Aziraphale wishes dearly he could just come up to him, wrap his arms around that constantly hypothermic body of his and pull him close and hold him there until all those sharp edges, twitchy motions and paranoia smoothed out completely, but he knows it'll most certainly only make matters worse. It's already a miracle that Crowley is here, with him, after all that's happened.

"The bed's ready, my dear," he says softly, lingering at the foot of the stairs in uncertainty. "No tartan anywhere, you have my word for it."

It is a sorry attempt at joking, Aziraphale knows it before the words leave his mouth, but the atmosphere is so tense he feels the need to somehow lighten it up. It doesn't seem to work anywhere near well enough, though, at least judging by the expression – or the lack thereof – on the demon's face as he turns around to face Aziraphale. He doesn't say anything, only nods and heads for the stairs, eyes down, shoulders slumped, shoeless feet stepping soundlessly on the carpeted floor. When he passes Aziraphale, he turns his head in the angel's direction but still refuses to meet his eyes.

"I never really minded it anyway," he mutters, so softly and expressionlessly Aziraphale can barely hear him at all, and then climbs the stairs, without looking back or uttering another word, leaving the angel even more dumbstruck, all alone in the middle of his ancient dusty bookshop.

Aziraphale follows him with his gaze, follows him until he disappears behind the closed door in the upstairs bedroom, and then screws his eyes shut, wishing to hold back the tears which are threatening to spill and failing miserably. They squeeze out in between his tightly pressed eyelids and run down his cheeks, leaving wet glistening trails after themselves. Almost angrily, Aziraphale wipes them away, sniffs and takes a few shaky, erratic breaths. He's got no right to feel all sorry for himself, he tells himself, no right whatsoever considering what kind of hell Crowley must be going through right now, but he can't help it just as he doesn't seem to be able to help Crowley. He dearly wishes he could, he wishes he could be allowed to love him and let his love heal all the wounds in the demon's soul, but he knows it wouldn't work this way, not with Crowley. So he sighs again, takes the tray with the tea, which has long grown cold, from the counter and carries it back to the kitchen, trying to distract himself from his oppressive thoughts by doing something which is at least routinely familiar.

They have talked but somehow there's still a lot – in fact, the most important part, the angel reflects anxiously – left unsaid. His confession turned out to be all jumbled, far from anything Aziraphale could possibly have imagined if he'd ever dreamt about disclosing his feelings to Crowley in the first place. He did tell him about his love but he's afraid the way it came out didn't manage to convey the profoundness of the feeling he's brought through all those countless years. Besides, the demon's own thoughts on it all are yet to be heard, if he ever decides to share them with Aziraphale at all. Crowley did say he was able to feel Aziraphale's love, and he assumes he remembers what they were to each other back in Heaven, but the angel's way too apprehensive to delude himself into believing that it means Crowley feels anything at all to him but what their Arrangement allows. Perhaps he's pushing the panic button unreasonably – after all, Crowley's reaction was much more adequate than could have been expected in the present circumstances, it's more than the angel could have ever dared to expect after the cold shoulder Crowley had given him back in Mayfair what seems like weeks instead of mere hours ago, but the entire situation somehow leaves a bitter taste of uncertainty and despondence at the back of his throat.   
  
It is a good sign that Crowley is willing to stay here at all, the angel tries to convince himself while restlessly pacing through the bookshop, he didn't flee, didn't make a scene, he  _is_  here, right? It must be reassuring, but it isn't.  
  
What Aziraphale longs for after all that's happened lately, the prevented Apocalypse included, is a chance to just stay with Crowley, simply be with him, feel the familiar reassuring presence, but he didn't dare to offer it to him, and the demon didn't ask for his company either. It's been three hours since then, which makes it just a little past midnight, and Aziraphale has been restless ever since, not being able to do something around the bookshop, or read, or sleep or do anything at all but keep going over and over that dialog they had while loitering aimlessly through the ground floor. He's made himself more tea, but the second long-cold pot of it is still standing on the kitchen counter, untouched just like the first one.

Normally, the angel doesn't mind these darkest, quietest hours of the night many people deem as the dreariest. Having lived among humans for thousands of years and having had a chance to witness their fleeting but dramatic lives, he isn't surprised anymore as to why they call them so – he has himself had many a long sleepless night haunted by thoughts way too oppressive and desperate for any angel to have – but he still bears with them understanding that such nights are perhaps his price to pay for the memories he has, and those are the memories he treasures, and he would never trade them for anything.   
  
Tonight, however, these dragging, lonely hours seem unusually hard to endure. Perhaps it's the knowledge that there's no sense left anymore in keeping secrets, or maybe it's the fact that Crowley is so incredibly close – closer than he's ever been over the millennia that followed his Fall – or possibly the fact that Aziraphale can sense the demon's confusion and his fear even from here, or it's all of those rolled in one, but as hours drag by, his desperation grows stronger and more difficult to withstand by the minute. When the waning Gibbous moon has finally made half its journey across the August night sky to spill some of its pale light through the torn greyish clouds into the window of the bookshop, Aziraphale feels he can't bear with this awful solitude any longer.   
  
As quietly as he can muster in order not to trigger the old wooden steps into producing a plaintive groan, Aziraphale tip-toes up the stairs and towards the one room which is located here, the bedroom which can by rights be called Crowley's as he's slept in it more nights than Aziraphale. He doesn't quite know what exactly he's going to do – perhaps simply stand in the doorway for a while like he's done on so many occasions prior, guarding the demon's sleep. He opens the door just as tentatively – he doesn't want to wake Crowley up because, if anything, the demon deserves a bit of peace – and then lets himself in.

The room is flooded with that silvery moonlight, its pale window-shaped rectangles lying on the carpet-covered floor and on the foot of the old, sturdy bed that occupies most part of the not particularly spacious bedroom. Crowley looks asleep snuggled beneath the duvet, a heavy, goose-down sort which Aziraphale himself finds way too warm for the season but, given Crowley's notorious innate state of being perpetually cold, suitable enough for the demon. For a while, he just stands there, watching, once again overwhelmed by the feeling of love he has for his counterpart in all their earthly businesses, marvelling at how this love has survived through thousands of years, transforming as both he and Crowley changed. But it's still there, he knows, as sincere and profound a feeling as it's ever been. Then, with a stifled helpless sigh, the angel finally enters the room, closes the door softly behind himself and heads for the bed. He sits on its very edge and leans against the headrest.

"Aziraphale?" Crowley asks, his voice muffled by the thick layer of the duvet but not sounding particularly sleepy, just bone-weary.

It startles the angel, but he does his best to suppress it. He doesn't want to seem guilty for being here, although he does feel so.  
  
"Yes, my dear," he confirms, a little apprehensively. "Didn't mean to wake you up."   
  
He doesn't say why he's here, and Crowley doesn't ask, which is a relief. He doesn't quite know what he'd say, but since the demon remains silent, Aziraphale remains where he is. It goes on for an indefinable period of time, the angel sitting motionlessly on one side of the mattress, keeping his eternal vigil by Crowley's bed, wishing to soothe and not daring to do it, and Crowley, fidgeting constantly and suppressing sighs and yawns time and again, on the other.

When the demon restlessly changes his position all over again, Aziraphale can only stand it this long.

"Can't sleep?" he asks quietly, even though the answer is obvious.

Crowley hums something unintelligible into the pillow by way of reply.  
  
Aziraphale sighs, trying to summon his courage, and speaks a brief prayer to guard him against making a huge mistake, not sure that even if it's heard by someone from Up Above, it'll be appreciated much. Having done that, he stretches himself on the unoccupied half of the bed alongside Crowley. Instead of touching him, though – he does know now that this uncalled-for affection may do more harm than good – he reaches out towards the demon and lets his hand hover just inches away from Crowley's dishevelled head. He doesn't know what he's hoping for, or rather, he knows what his very soul desires but is less than certain that the demon is either willing or able to give it to him. In light of their recent conversation, though, maybe, just maybe…

"Come here?" he offers softly, heart thumping in his throat so hard that his voice is actually shaking. 

For a while, Crowley doesn't respond in any way, neither saying nor doing anything, making Aziraphale wonder whether he's just made another mistake, after all. But then, when the angel is on the verge of losing his nerve completely, Crowley lets out a long shaky sigh, rolls onto his side and in one spookily fluid, inhumanly graceful, motion ends up snuggled close to him in a cloud of duvet, with his long limbs snaking their way around him and with his face, much warmer now than it was back in the windblown gallery up on St. Paul's, nuzzled into the crook of his neck.

Aziraphale feels a soft, shaky breath ghost against his skin, and it sounds like a mixture between a sigh of relief and that of helpless resignation. Closing his eyes, the angel wraps his own arms around the demon's lean frame, to his utter bewilderment encountering no fabric in the way – the palms of his hands slide against the warm smoothness of the demon's bare skin.  
  
At first, he doesn't dare move, he barely breathes at all, because, despite Crowley's arms being wrapped around him so tightly as if he was drowning and clutching at him as his only hope for survival, his naked body feels like a live wire pressed against him, tense and rigid as if he's either in physical pain or on the verge of jumping out of bed and bolting out of here. After a while, though, the tension gradually eases, leaving the demon limp and warm in his embrace, and the feeling is so sensational, so extraordinary, that it takes Aziraphale's breath away completely. He hugs Crowley even more fiercely, all those hundreds upon hundreds of years of unwilling separation now acting as some mysterious attractive force, and just like this, this instantaneously, the angel gives in.

Overwhelmed by this improbable closeness, Aziraphale turns his head just a tiny fraction so that his lips could press to Crowley's temple, his ruffled hair getting in the way, but oh just how silken it is, and the sensation is so painfully, achingly familiar Aziraphale is unable to suppress a moan, a sound which is more desperate in its quality than excited. He feels Crowley's arms squeezing around him as if in response to it, and, for the first time in millennia, the angel consciously  _allows_  himself to hope.

"My dear…" he murmurs breathlessly, his hands stroking up and down Crowley's back, fingertips counting the protruding vertebrae of his spine, palms massaging his bony shoulders, and the demon responds to him with his body language. He is all but melting into Aziraphale's touch, trembling minutely under the tender caresses of his hands, breathing heavily, his exhales and inhales a teasing sequence of moist, warm puffs of air on the angel's throat.  
  
Yet time passes and Crowley's shivering doesn't subside, and it's even more confusing this way, as if he is both yearning this intimacy and at the same time is utterly terrified of it. Aziraphale doesn't want to let go – letting Crowley go is the last thing in the world he feels like doing, not now, not ever – but from his experience, it's the only right thing to do. He's scared that if he pushes Crowley way too far out of his comfort zone – and over the past several days, he's already been way out of it – it might provoke the demon to run again, and he can't have that.   
  
"It's still not alright, is it?" he murmurs, trying to brace himself for the reply which is bound to come. He should be able to know better than asking.  
  
" _Alright_?" Crowley's voice is muffled but unmistakably strained. Unwillingly, Aziraphale loosens his hold not wishing to continue to cause him discomfort. "Of course, it's bloody well not alright. It's nowhere near alright, angel."  
  
"I'm sorry," Aziraphale sighs. Then he loosens his embrace just a little more.   
  
Crowley, though, doesn't seem to be aware either of the angel's apology or the fact that he's not forced into this physical proximity anymore. He doesn't move away and keeps talking instead, ever so quietly but in a disconcertingly agitated manner.  
  
"I'm a bloody demon, have been one for millennia, anyway, I--  _this_ is not supposed to be happening to me." His breathing tickles Aziraphale's throat with every word he says. "I'm not supposed to be feeling it, I'm not supposed to be feeling your love, Aziraphale. I should've been annihilated ages ago, from merely  _being_  near you, let alone… let alone  _this_."  
  
He sounds so utterly unnerved that the angel tentatively returns his arms to where they were, around Crowley's shoulders.  
  
"I'm not supposed to remember anything. I'm not supposed to need  _this_ so much, angel."  
  
He sucks in another shaky breath, and Aziraphale resumes the stroking.

"I  _love_  you," Crowley says, almost sobs, ever so quietly. The angel's hand freezes in mid-motion. "I tried to ignore it the best I could, but I guess there's no point in it anymore given what I was made to remember, is there?"

Aziraphale feels the demon's lips, moist and soft, on the side of his neck, and then closes his eyes, squeezes them shut, and sinks his slightly crooked teeth into his plump lower lip hoping the pain will distract him enough to prevent tears, but it doesn't, and they overflow and spill from his eyes for the second time over the past several hours, rolling down his cheeks and onto the pillow. He squeezes Crowley tighter, wanting to tell him the same, tell him that he loves him more than anything, has loved him for eternity, but he cannot, is physically incapable of it, and all that leaves his mouth is a couple of muffled, wet sobs, and then even those evolve into weeping.   
  
He cries, holding Crowley, holding on to Crowley, holding him close because he seems both the most solid and the most surreal thing in the entire universe, and he's terrified of losing him even though as of now the demon doesn't make a single attempt to wriggle free. After a while, it's Crowley's own hand which begins, very tentatively at first, to move up and down the angel's side. Aziraphale doesn't say anything – he still cannot – and squeezes Crowley even tighter, and in response, Crowley's hand relocates first to the nape of his neck and then to the back of his head, fingers raking through his curls with astounding gentleness.

"I was sure you'd Fall," Crowley mumbles all of a sudden, very quietly. He sounds terrified.

Aziraphale is way too preoccupied with what's happening right here and now to be able to grasp the point Crowley's trying to make. When there's only silence from him, the demon goes on in the same hushed, pained, whisper.

"Back after the Inquisition thing, when…" he swallows, the sound loud in the stillness of the night. "When you  _made love_  to me, I thought you'd gone completely insane, I thought you'd have to Fall for it, inevitably, but I was so awestruck by you and what you were doing to me and your blessssed love I couldn't do anything about it. I couldn't even say anything, let alone make you stop. Why didn't you Fall, angel?"

Aziraphale sniffs before he speaks and feels how the demon's fingertips run against his scalp, impossibly tender. _Is this really happening?_ he asks himself for what seems like a hundredth time over the past several hours.

"Because, as you said yourself, I was making  _love_  to you," he says softly.

"Even though the one you made love to was a demon, huh?"

"So it turned out."

"Turned out? You didn't know for sure?"

Aziraphale remains silent for a few moments, then sighs and admits, "I didn't. I doubt there's policy up there on angels loving demons. But I knew what I felt, Crowley, so I reckoned that if I had to Fall for truly loving someone…" he leaves the rest unsaid.

The thing is, there wasn't much reckoning done on his part at all, but he doesn't feel like telling Crowley about that, not right now anyway. And besides, it doesn't even matter anymore.

"Promise me you won't run this time?" Aziraphale whispers against the demon's ear instead. "Promise me that if there's something – anything – that I do which makes you feel uncomfortable, you'll let me know before you decide to walk out on me, Crowley, promise me?"

"I don't think I have anywhere else to run to anymore," Crowley sighs. "Looks like I've been running back here all this time anyway."

 _For six millennia_ , the angel thinks, and the pain of it, suppressed for so long, is overwhelming in its profoundness.

"How does it feel for a demon to…" he asks suddenly and trails off, not sure whether it is a good idea. But he's already begun, so in for a penny, in for a pound, he thinks and goes on, "to love?"

"A li'l suffocating," Crowley huffs.

"It's not hurting you?" Aziraphale asks, alarmed, because, for some reason, he's sure it should, just like angelic healing does.

To his immense relief, he feels Crowley shake his head lightly. "No, not really," the demon whispers. "I don't know why not. Perhaps because I'm not a total stranger to you and your love, after all."

"Is it any different from when you were an angel?" Aziraphale goes on with his questions, deciding to use the chance while Crowley's unusually willing to talk. "You remember it?"

There's a long pause before the demon speaks next, so much so that the angel wonders whether he should have kept his mouth shut and not press it too much.

"I… it's weird, angel…" he says at last. "I remember now – I  _know_ , actually – I loved you back in Heaven, and I know I felt your love, but with those memories back… it's like the facts are there inside my head, but the feelings aren't… The feelings from those times, I mean," Crowley trails off, a bit awkwardly. "I remember loving you, but I don't know what exactly it felt like back then. I fell in love with you all over again, here. I don't know when, but it was hard to keep ignoring after the fifteenth century."

"That's the best thing you've ever said to me, Crowley," Aziraphale says softly after a long pause, awed, with fresh tears rolling down his cheeks.   
  
" _Angel_ ," Crowley murmurs, and for the first time in six millennia it sounds like a caress. There are his fingertips on Aziraphale's face, wiping the moisture away, thus provoking even more tears to run. "They owe us an eternity for this."

***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, all of you guys! Hope it was an enjoyable ride :)


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